Love and Loss

So I'm talking with my co-worker Paul and I mention how pets and helium balloons teach children the same lessons, one is long-term and the other is short-term.

Pets teach kids about personal responsibility because the kids learn to take care of the animals, unless the parents do it once the kitten turns into a boring and less cuddly cat; unconditional love that animals -- except for cats, and I guess reptiles and fish -- give to the ones who feed and care for them; and eventually loss when the pet dies, usually suddenly, if the kid lives in a rural area. Country roads and dogs don't mix. Neither do foxes and housecats. Personal experience with both for me.

Helium balloons teach kids basically the same thing: personal responsibility, in that you have to hold onto the string to keep your balloon; unconditional love or joy, at the time of ownership of the balloon because they are fun and novel to kids; and loss, in that if you don't hold onto the string, you will watch your balloon ascend to its freedom in the sky ("Shadow has gone to doggie heaven").

How we got on this topic was that Paul doesn't have any pets and he has no plans to get any for his kids. I asked him if he was OK with his kids not learning any of these lessons and he said that he was. I don't think he takes this as seriously as I do. ;-)