tweety joins the family · after a five week demonstration of responsibility, thomas finally has a bird. there are a couple of pictures in the photo gallery. i must say that thomas surprised me on this one. the capability of a seven-year-old to be responsible and to persevere is greater than i thought.

five weeks ago thomas had a bit of money saved up and decided he wanted a bird. i told him i felt he was too young. i raised a bird growing up---family dog ended up eating it, sad story for another time---and so i'm familiar with the care and effort required. i tried to impress upon him the seriousness of being responsible for another living thing. though i'm a parent, i haven't forgotten what it was like to be a child, and his reaction was predictable and understandable. he believed himself to be capable of this responsibility.

after failing to convince him that he needed to wait until he was a bit older, we finally struck a deal. i offered to give him some responsibilities, which, if he could fulfill for one month, would convince me he would be capable of caring for a bird. i decided to give him the responsibility of feeding and watering honey and coco. not a tremendous responsibility, but an important one that would have to be attended to on a daily basis. he wasn't happy about it, but of course he agreed.

it took five weeks instead of four, but thomas proved himself. he learned some things along the way, like responsibilities don't go away when you're tired or you feel bad, but his determination was considerable and i'm very proud of him. around the third week he told me one night that being responsible for something made him feel good inside, and i began to believe he understood. i had planned to ask him to continue taking care of the dogs even after he had his bird, but this past week he offered to do this of his own accord.