Mollie T. Cox, Author at 100 Words

Love It Or Send It Back

July 18th, 2021
Mollie T. Cox

No matter the school choice, summer is a big buying season for the coming academic year. Based on reviews, I occasionally bought curriculum unseen. When it arrived, I sometimes had doubts after looking at the teacher’s guide or skimming the text.

However, I would talk myself into liking it because I thought I should. Others claimed it was their favorite. Or I had spent much time deciding. Or I had spent a lot of money. Or it was a bargain. Or several of the above.

Along the way, I learned to trust my misgivings. No matter how much I hoped that a doubtful curriculum would work, it never did.

If I didn’t like a choice from the beginning, I never would.

I should send it back and pay the postage. (See Free Shipping, No Thanks Here)

The same principle applied to store purchases, especially clothing. If I didn’t love it in the dressing room, I should leave it. Research shows an item is worth the most at the moment of purchase. Afterwards, the value diminishes. I learned liking wasn’t enough to pull out my wallet.

What do you need to return?

Friendship

Walking Each Other Home

July 11th, 2021
Mollie T. Cox

When all is said and done, we’re really just all walking each other home.
Ram Dass

No matter your opinion of Ram Dass, this quote is worth considering. After hearing it, I pondered what it meant to walk someone home. What did it mean for someone to walk me home?

Walking someone home seems simple. It provides company. Company provides safety. Conversation makes a journey seem quicker. Companions lighten our load.

On a deeper level, walking each other home involves vulnerability and intimacy. In olden days, a man declared his intentions with “May I see you home?”

You don’t announce you are walking someone home. You have to be allowed. Especially today, trust is established before a home’s location is revealed.

Walking each other home is a privilege.

Ultimately, walking each other home means arriving at the same destination. Therefore, I need to be aware of the objectives of my fellow travelers.

Who is walking you home? Whom are you walking home?

In my Father’s house are many rooms. If it were not so, would I have told you that I go to prepare a place for you?
John 14:2 (ESV)

Money

A Favorite Money Story

July 4th, 2021
Mollie T. Cox

Jesus used the power of a story to help his disciples understand and remember spiritual truths. We can follow his example as we teach.

In Famer Boy by Laura Ingalls Wilder, the town has gathered for a 4^th of July Celebration. A cousin dares seven-year-old Almanzo Wilder to ask his father for a nickel to spend on lemonade. Almanzo knows he will be denied, but he asks to save his pride. Instead of a nickel, his father shows Almanzo a half dollar.

It’s work, son,” Father said. “That’s what money is; it’s hard work.

He asks Almanzo to describe the process of raising potatoes. Almanzo complies.

That’s what’s in this half-dollar, Almanzo. The work that raised half a bushel of potatoes is in it.

Mr. Wilder gives the half dollar to Almanzo so he can buy a suckling pig—and raise a litter of pigs worth $4-5 each—or buy lemonade to drink. Almanzo returns to his peers who are envious when they learn that he is buying a suckling pig.

For a couple of years, “Suckling pig or suck lemonade,” was a way to remind our boys of wise financial choices.

Has a story helped you illustrate a principle?

Book Recommendations, Parenting

Protect the Colts

June 27th, 2021
Mollie T. Cox

While playing with peers, my sons were exposed to inappropriate, harmful behavior. My husband and I made the hard—yet easy—decision that there must be adult supervision when our boys were with a certain child.

The day after we explained our unpopular stance, we providentially read aloud Farmer Boy by Laura Ingalls Wilder. Young Almanzo wanted to train the two-year-old colts, but his father said,

A boy who didn’t know any better might scare a young horse, or tease it, or even strike it … It would learn to bite and kick and hate people.

When Almanzo persisted chapters later, he was told,

In five minutes you can teach them tricks it will take me months to gentle out of them.

Eventually, Almanzo went too near the colts. His father repeated his warnings.

That’s too good a colt to be spoiled. I won’t have you teaching tricks that I’ll have to train out of it.

We were accused of being overprotective, of taking mischief too seriously. We knew it was deeper. Unexpectedly reading Wilder’s words—written over fifty years earlier—was encouraging. How much more valuable were boys than colts.

Have you received parenting encouragement from an unexpected source?

Homeschooling

Curriculum To Grow Into

June 20th, 2021
Mollie T. Cox

The forty-something father held up a Christmas-present turtleneck and asked, “How do I know my mom gave this to me?” He answered his own question with “There’s room for me to grow into it.” We laughed even though clothes to grow into are never funny, not as children nor as adults—especially when our growth will not be in height.

He then told about childhood clothes that were worn out or ripped or not his interest by the time they fit. He felt like this happened too often until he was old enough to choose or buy his own clothes.

Along the way, I learned that curriculum to grow into was even worse than over-sized clothes.

By the time prematurely bought curriculum became age appropriate, it was forgotten, did not suit our current style, or something better had been published. Occasionally, I was simply tired of looking at it on the shelf and wanted something new. The money saved from snatching a bargain or planning too far ahead was not worth the eventual waste. Freshly purchased curriculum met needs better and boosted learning.

Are you waiting for something to fit? How is that working?