Lettin’ Loose
Do you know what one of the best parts of my day is? My daughter says “Yippee!” In fact, she says it a lot.
“We’re going to the store.” “Yippee!”
“Here’s your milk.” “Yippeee!”
“Let’s go walk to school.” “Yippee!”
No big deal, just tosses it into the conversation and then skips along her merry way.
Now I sit here for a few minutes, thinking about how wonderful it is that someone can look out at the world and think it’s worth a “Yippee!” and have no reservations about sharing that feeling with the rest of the world. And after a moment or two of that, my brain moves on to “You know, maybe Ralph Waldo Emerson was on to something in ‘Self-Reliance’ when he says we should say what’s on our minds and not be concerned about how it affects other people or what they’ll think.” And it occurs to me that it wouldn’t be “Yippee!” all the time, but still, there’s something to be said for letting loose.
There’s also something to be said to harnessing the raw power of five year olds and solving the energy crisis, but that’s another point.
About Dave Thomer
Born and raised in Philadelphia. Studied philosophy at Fordham University in the Bronx, where I made many great friends and met my wonderful wife. We moved back to Philadelphia, where I studied philosophy some more and became a teacher. Online and off, I'm looking for ways that we can be better citizens and build stronger communities.
Thursday, June 21st 2007 at 9:48 pm |
Isn’t it ironic that by the time we are old enough and wise enough to use the energy we has when we were five it is all gone.