Friday, June 09, 2006

Precious Memories

Dr James Dobson dishes out pearls of wisdom through his daily Focus On The Family column in TODAY. Here are some excerpts from yesterday’s story entitled Precious Memories:

“I encourage you to take the time to record the memorable moments you enjoy with your children. If you don’t have time to take elaborate notes or if you don’t have access to a VCR recorder, keep a diary, record an audio tape, and by all means maintain a photo album.

Having lived to see my children grow up and leave the nest, I can tell you that the effort you invest in preserving their early childhood experiences will pay big dividends as the years unfold and time blurs the memories.”


My regular reader Fuzzoo must be thinking the same thing. She has gone one step further, in fact. She set up a blog called Road to PSLE to capture memories of her 3 darling daughters.

Dr Dobson also narrated a funny incident involving the innocent and yet often hilarious remarks that children sometimes make. His story reminds me of an old black-and-white TV series called Kids Say the Darndest Things hosted by Art Linkletter. Do you remember this really funny show? I believe about 10 years ago, Bill Cosby resurrected this programme. In fact our own MediaCorp also tried to do a similar programme. It was hosted by Andrew Lim who played Paul in the Under One Roof sitcom. Unfortunately, our version simply was not as funny as the Americans’ – it fact it wasn’t funny at all; and the programme was stopped after a short run.

I too have a funny kids-say-the-darndest-thing story to share with you.

3 jokers in garden - 22 Mar 98


This happened about 15 years ago, when my eldest daughter was around kindergarten age. One night we were watching this TV show – I cannot remember the title; it’s about a deaf lawyer played by Marlee Matlin. Anyway, there was this romantic scene where the couple were smooching on a couch. Slowly they started to kiss and then sort of flopped over side-ways out of view of the camera. I almost ‘fell on the floor laughing’ when I heard my daughter remark innocently; “Wah – kiss until fall down.”




"Memories are time that you borrow,
To spend when you get to tomorrow"
- Paul Anka, Times of Your Life

10 comments:

fuzzoo said...

Oh, the blog is just one of the things I do to preserve the memory of my children's childhood. I also create home videos complete with music soundtracks which the kids never tire of watching.

Lam Chun See said...

Last year I too converted some old VHS tapes into dvds and watched with my relatives in Ipoh. We had such a good time. Even my children marvelled at how cute they used to be.

Chris Sim said...

Funny post Chun See. I remember an incident involving my son when he was about 5 or 6. We were travelling in a taxi, and suddenly out of the blue, he asked me, "Dad, why is fxxx?". He must have learned that from the TV. Flabbergasted that my young boy should utter the four-letter word, I was left speechless momentarily. I glanced up and caught the side view of the cab driver whose smile told me that he was equally amused. What did I tell my boy? I can't remember... but I think something like "this is a bad and rude word and don't ever use it on anyone" or something like that. Now, the 13-year-old's language is more "colourful" than his old man. Hee.

Ivan Chew said...

"You don't know what you have, until it's gone" -- goes one of the line in the 80s rock ballad by the band, Cinderella. How many times have we heard or even spoken it ourselves "I wished I had done that..."

With technology, free blog tools, even a good ole fashioned paper journal, what's stopping us? Time? Bo-chapness? Heh

Anonymous said...

I have two daughters, the younger one is more street-smart, kiasu, and has a keen sense of 'self-preservation'. When she was about six years old, on one occasion, handed me a sweet and told me to taste it. I asked what was it and she retorted - "don't ask". After tasting, finding it quite nice, I asked her why she gave it to me. You know what was her answer ? Her reply: "I want to find out whether it is poisonous or not !"

Lam Chun See said...

Zen - Good thing the sweet you took was not poisonous. Otherwise GMY will have one less reader, and many insightful comments.

Anonymous said...

Another story, this time was the elder one. When young she was not very healthy. On one occasion we brought her (about two years old) to see our family doctor in town. As the car turned the the corner of the building where the the clinic was located, she could at once recognise the premises, realising that we were heading for the doctor, cried louding, wanting to get off the car. She must have remembered the many injections she had received.

Victor said...

Looks like your daughter not only said the darndest thing when she was young. Weren't you saying that you asked her for her opinion of your blog recently and she said, "Wah! So many words.". LOL.

Lam Chun See said...

Not the same. That was my youngest.

7-8 said...

Unless I am mistaken the movie is "Children of a Lesser God"