WORDS FOR THOUGHT: 1, 2, 3 Hush Puppy or Practice what you preach

There a lot of things a man should understand by the time he hits 30 years of age.

They include simple things like always putting the toilet seat down or more complex things like handling the death of a loved one.

The moment a person thinks that they've learned enough or adopts the dreaded mentality that they know everything, they become the most ignorant person on Earth.

The flood of knowledge from a five-year-old is ever increasing, and the idea of him having more insight than most grown-ups is always humbling to me.

Here's a background story on the most recent example of this truth.

I exited the gas station and got into the driver's seat of the car where the wife and children sat in silence.

A very, very odd silence.

It was odd because I couldn't recall the last time that happened with the exception of kids being asleep.

Taking it for what it was worth, I played along and didn't say anything. I was unaware that I was in the midst of a round of "1, 2, 3, Hush Puppy."

*This is the 21st-century equivalent of the quiet game – also known to other generations as "be quiet or else." (No one I know was ever brave enough to find out exactly what "or else" was).

So I took this silence in the car as a brief and rare moment, and reveled in it.

An eternity passed. It seemed like a whole lifetime of seasons changing -- the whole world changed, before the silence was broken.

"8, 2, 3, we can stop now," the boy chirped from the back.

The moment of clarity was broken, and I glanced at the clock which read 8:23 p.m.

Then the wife made it all make sense.

"Ok, we're done. Do you know how long you were quiet for?" She asked this with that all-knowing tone only mothers have. "Three minutes," she said.

My jaw dropped. That was what three minutes of silence from the kids is like?

It felt like at least a week's worth of quiet and calm. I had time to reflect on my day and even ponder the meaning of life.

Those three minutes of silence, both shockingly long and oh-so-short, brought forth a flood of things I should have been thinking about all along.

What happened to that hamster we had?

The dimension of time is a funny thing. The perception of it is even funnier.

They say time flies when you're having fun. This is true, but not the whole truth. In reality, time flies, and that's where the adage should end.

As the boy spends so much time thinking about what kind of car he wants to drive when he gets his license (yeah, that's already a concern for a five year old American male), we keep telling him not to wish his life away.

I think back to all of the late-night diaper changing and wishing he was house broken (or do they call this "potty-trained" now? I'm still confused on this one).

All of those moments flooded back with one similarity.

Once the boy was able and demanding to do those things by himself, the want to help and take care of him became stronger.

Although the memories will last, I realize that I've wished parts of his and my own life away.

I don't really want to get into a live for today because tomorrow isn't promised versus always plan for the future debate.

But it is a question I ponder daily. Can we really sit here and enjoy today without worrying about what tomorrow will bring? On the opposite side, why waste time basking in the glory of today when we can be working to make future days brighter?

It's hard to find a medium on that one.

Just a few blocks from the house after a few minutes of backseat chatter I hear "ok, let's play again, 1, 2, 3 Hush Puppy."

But by then I forgot what I was thinking about. What do the wheels on the bus do again?

Jesse Murphy is managing editor at the Maryville Daily Forum. He can be reached at jmurphy@maryvilledailyforum.com