All I need to know...

I klassrummet där jag hade engelskaundervisningen på högstadiet och gymnasiet (i Tyskland är det ju en och samma skola) hängde en affich med mycket visdom:




All I really need to know I learned in kindergarten.
ALL I REALLY NEED TO KNOW about how to live and what to do
and how to be I learned in kindergarten. Wisdom was not
at the top of the graduate-school mountain, but there in the
sandpile at Sunday School. These are the things I learned:



Share everything.

Play fair.

Don't hit people.

Put things back where you found them.

Clean up your own mess.

Don't take things that aren't yours.

Say you're sorry when you hurt somebody.

Wash your hands before you eat.

Flush.

Warm cookies and cold milk are good for you.

Live a balanced life - learn some and think some
and draw and paint and sing and dance and play
and work every day some.

Take a nap every afternoon.

When you go out into the world, watch out for traffic,
hold hands, and stick together.

Be aware of wonder.
Remember the little seed in the styrofoam cup:
The roots go down and the plant goes up and nobody
really knows how or why, but we are all like that.

Goldfish and hamsters and white mice and even
the little seed in the Styrofoam cup - they all die.
So do we.

And then remember the Dick-and-Jane books
and the first word you learned - the biggest
word of all - LOOK.



Everything you need to know is in there somewhere.
The Golden Rule and love and basic sanitation.
Ecology and politics and equality and sane living.

Take any of those items and extrapolate it into
sophisticated adult terms and apply it to your
family life or your work or your government or
your world and it holds true and clear and firm.
Think what a better world it would be if
all - the whole world - had cookies and milk about
three o'clock every afternoon and then lay down with
our blankies for a nap. Or if all governments
had a basic policy to always put thing back where
they found them and to clean up their own mess.

And it is still true, no matter how old you
are - when you go out into the world, it is best
to hold hands and stick together.


© Robert Fulghum, 1990.
Found in Robert Fulghum, All I Really Need To Know I Learned In Kindergarten, Villard Books: New York, 1990, page 6-7.



Im Klassenzimmer meines Englischlehrers hing ein Plakat mit dem obigen Text. Eine Menge kluge Gedanken, die wir leider viel zu oft vergessen.

Summertime...and the living's easy

Der erste Sommer als Mama. Zeit für entspannte Picknicks im Park oder am See ausruhen gibt es im Prinzip nicht. Das Hasenkind krabbelt und klettert und will die Welt auf eigenen Knien erkunden. Gras sieht spannend aus und muss gekostet werden. Zwischendurch kommen die großen Hunger- und Müdigkeitsattacken, die nur ein echter Abenteurer kennen kann. Zum Glück kommt Farmor zu Hilfe, so dass Mama auch mal ein bisschen zum Spaß lesen kann.



Första sommaren som mamma. Mycket tid för lugna fikaträff i parken eller badutflykter finns inte. Plutten kryper och klättrar och vill upptäcka allt på egna knän. Gräs är en spännande sak och måste smakas. Emellan kommer hemska hunger- och trötthetsattacker som bara äventyrare känner till. Tur att vi har farmor som hjälper till då och då. Så kan även mamma läsa lite för nöjes skull.



Und so gibts Pfifferlinge en masse.
Och så finns det kantareller en masse.