History repeats itself

I was gearing up to write about how amazing my 13-year-old, Mik, is, and I kept thinking about something I wrote a long time ago—about how, when he was 5, even though he really didn't know how to swim yet, he passed the 50-yard swimming test he had to complete to go down the waterslide at our pool. He did it with sheer perseverance and determination and a refusal to get tired or discouraged, which is exactly how he met his goal of swimming a sectionals qualifying time this weekend.

I'm an extreme optimist, but I NEVER thought he'd actually be able to make sectionals this year, just like I thought it would be impossible for that little kid to make it all the way across the pool. Shows you what I know.

Anyway, I couldn't find that post—it probably got deleted with my old blog—but I ran across something even better. Back when I was training for my first marathon, I let the kids earn some extra computer time by writing these little essays on what they thought of marathoning:

Mik, age 8: I thingk it is fun. It is a very good sport! I like running to. It is the 2nd best sport! I lik it and you do to.
Dex, age 11: Cons: My opinion on marathons is, why do people do them? The thing is you don't have to. Why pay money to run a long way? You have to train for months, you get really sore, and all you're training for is to run some more. Over the months you trained you probably ran twice the way you would have run on the marathon.
Pros: Once you have run a long way you feel you have ocomplished somthing. On the race you have lots of people chearing for you. When you pay to do it you get bottled watter allong the way. My Mom likes marathons. I love my mom.

If I asked them today, they'd each have EXACTLY the same opinions. I know people can change, but my kids never seem to. Which is fine by me.