My oldest brought up an interesting happening at dinner the other day. During his class’s birthday snack, one of the other students had to say no thanks to the treats. The big guy explained that celebrating birthdays was against the student’s religion (*).

“I wonder why that was,” he said.

My wife explained that different religions have different traditions, and that there’s nothing wrong with not celebrating birthdays.

“But he’ll get to decide when he’s older, right?” my son asked.

“Yep,” I said. “Just like you guys.”

He laughed. “Oh no. I don’t want to change. I like parties.”

“Hmm,” his little brother said, considering. Then he nodded seriously. “I think we can stick with it.”

* Writer’s note: I want to take a moment to say that this situation was handled perfectly by the teacher. There was no drama or big deal made of the child’s religion. In fact, I think the only reason my son knew about it was because he’s friend with that child.]

Today’s Tale is in the Chronicle. Click here to read it.

Terms for Searchers: Monkey, Darwin, Evolution, Creationism, trouble

I had to rent a car last week while mine was being repaired (dead alternator). It was an old blue beater of a car, pulled to the left as I drove, and didn’t have power anything.

As we were driving away from the rental place, my youngest shouted in surprise. “Hey Daddy, there’s a crank! Look, you turn the crank and the window opens. That’s crazy!”

“Yep,” I said. “Pretty crazy.”

“But there’s no button, there’s a crank!”

“I know,” I said. “This is how cars used to be. Old school.”

“Yeah,” my oldest chimed in. “Old School!”

I nodded. He is, after all, almost 8. If anyone knows old school, it’s got to be him.

A few minutes later, my youngest let out a frustrated grunt. ”Uhhh! This is hard!”

Yep. That’s old school, all right.