Saving the World

My 6 year old daughter E keeps talking about saving the world. She has been learning about endangered species at school and also sees trash all over the place (which she tries to pick up and throw away). It makes me happy that she thinks about taking care of the planet, but I worry that she is taking responsibility over it to the extent that she isn’t being a kid.

The reason why that crosses my mind is that right after new years when we went to the playground at her school, we picked up trash for 45 minutes in the rain instead of playing there because E wanted to clean up her school. I try to remind her that it’s great to take action, but I don’t want her to feel personally responsible for everything that is wrong. We just do the best we can and that’s that. She always agrees and then we take action.

My 4 year old son C sees his sister do all of these things. He knows she wants to save the world and he loves being with her. Apparently he told my wife that he wants to follow E around and become a journalist. That way he could write about all the amazing things she does to save the Earth. That made me smile and I love the fact that they love each other so much.

Although they fight a lot and C is still getting over his hitting phase, it doesn’t come between them. They are still very close and that’s all a parent could ask for. Something we are doing is working and trying to foster a relationship built on teamwork instead of competition is shaping their dynamic in a positive way. Hopefully this keeps growing the right way and maybe they will end up saving the world together!