Birthday & dinner reflection

Tonight we went to a Japanese Steakhouse for my birthday dinner (the one in Lake Worth next to Albertson's - recommended by Katy). Not quite as good as Shogun's, but very comparable. Most importantly, well worth not having to spend the time and gas money to drive to Hurst.

Yesterday was my actual birthday, but Ben had a volleyball game. Being a second-year medical student, he gets so little time to play and do things for himself, I was not about to begrudge him this. Besides, when my last child in care was picked up, I was so tired yesterday afternoon, and I wasn't quite up to going out. Ben and I had stayed up Sunday night talking in bed until the wee hours of the morning (how often do we do that?) so it was a multi-Dr. Pepper day on Monday.

As we were nearing the end of our meal, a Japanese family was seated at the Hibachi grill-table next to ours (we were alone at ours). They had several children with them, including a young boy a few months older than Jackson. Jackson and this boy struck up an instant friendship with a side-by-side call-and-answer table-slapping game. Jackson would slap the table 2 or 3 times and look over at the little Asian boy, and the boy would mimic Jackson. They were both smiling from ear to ear and giggling. I was inspired by the children's quick friendship, especially considering that neither could even technically verbally communicate with each other.

Later (the children lost interest after a few minutes), the boy became impatient for his meal and began to be fussy. Evident that the family had come unprepared, we offered the last of Jackson's animal cookies and an apple juice pack we had stored for just such an emergency. The family accepted and seemed grateful. They thanked us several times as we were leaving.

In the car on the way home, Ben mentioned how isn't it interesting that 65 years ago (a few less) that Jackson and his cute little friend would have been sworn mortal enemies? I was quiet for a moment, contemplating that comment, secretly feeling it impossible for my happy-go-lucky little cherub to conspire to hate anyone, ever, in his whole life, but it made me think. Maybe Ben was right. It makes me sad though that the world was/is like that during war - that 2 families couldn't just share a cute bond between their children and would have to hate each other without even knowing each other. Would I have still felt empathy for this mother and felt inspired to share what food we had with her? I would like to think so.

Anyway, I had a wonderful birthday and thank you to everyone who made me feel special with a comment, card, phonecall or gift. It was a wonderful day yesterday. AND I have 2 new kids with me this week and they are awesome! They are so motivated to learn. This week we are learning about the letter B and our weekly theme is birthdays. Today in group time I had a birthday bag, and my "friends" had to help me decide which items could go in my bag. Only things that started with /b/ could go inside the birthday bag.

At the beginning of group time, we "Shake Our Sillies Out" with the song on CD so that we can sit still, with our hands in our lap, and learn. Today during the "jump our jiggles out" verse, Jackson got so excited while the kids were jumping around. He was chasing them all and giggling, wiggling all the while. I think he was trying to jump, too, but couldn't figure it out. He is going to learn so much from these big kids!