This Is the Weekend That Was -- November 14, 2008

How do children change you? They make you like puzzles when you never have liked them before. We spent the weekend building, destroying, building, destroying and building again a jigsaw puzzle one of the boys had gotten at some point as a birthday present. Their excitement, their pride in their accomplishment each time they finished it was contagious. To the point that I found myself at 6:30 PM on Sunday night making an impromptu dash to Fred Meyer to buy 10 additional puzzles.

Before puzzles, writing. The boys were telling us stories at Starbucks on Saturday morning, creating characters and narrating adventures for them. When we got home I sat with each of them and had them tell me their story while I typed it up and then printed it for them. Then they each sat and illustrated their own stories; we stapled the finished pages and they were authors and illustrators. Here's what they wrote:

Studento the Not Nice Student
by C.J.Y.

ONCE upon a time, there was a boy named Studento the Not Nice Student.

Studento never brought his own lunch to school. Instead he would take everybody else’s food when they weren’t looking and he would eat it. Everybody was sad about that and they would cry.

The people thought maybe if they went inside to eat, they could get away from Studento the Not Nice Student. But he opened the door and came inside and took their food way.

So they grabbed it back from him, pushed him outside and locked all the doors so he couldn’t get in. Then they could eat their lunches in peace.

After that, the police came and put Studento the Not Nice Student in jail.

While Studento was in jail, he had time to think about the bad things he had done.

Studento the Not Nice Student realized he should be nicer. He should not do bad things like stealing peoples’ food. Instead he thought he should make them tomato cookies, because everybody loves tomato cookies.

Then the police let Studento the Not Nice Student out of jail and he went home and baked tomato cookies for everyone at school. When he gave the cookies to everyone he said “Sorry.”

Everybody was happy and they said, “Thank you, Studento, for being nicer.” After that, everyone called him Studento the Nice Student. And he never stole their food again.

THE END

Helmet Hero
by R.O.Y.

ONCE upon a time, there was a boy named Helmet Hero.

There was a bad guy named Boodie who was not listening to a nice person.

Boodie should have been listening to the nice person so Helmet Hero had to fight him.

Then Helmet Hero and the police put Boodie in jail for being bad.

When he was in jail, Boodie thought about the bad things he had done.

He thought he should be nicer to people. So he asked Helmet Hero to let him out of jail so he could go home and make chocolate chip cookies with frosting on the chocolate chips for everybody he had been mean to.

Boodie brought the cookies to everyone and shared them. Boodie said “sorry, everybody.”

Everybody said “Thank you, Boodie” when they took a cookie.

The people all said “Thank you” to Helmet Hero for making Boodie be nice.

THE END

It is clear that both of my children believe in the redemptive power of incarceration and that the role of prison is to reform. And shouldn't every man know where his children stand on that debate?

And that is the weekend that was.