Sunday, August 19, 2007

Fish for the Sharks

(19 Aug 2007)

So last night I'm putting my (almost) 4 year old daughter to bed. It's a whole routine where we take a bath, brush teeth and hair, and read a book - usually something real exciting like "Red Fish, Blue Fish", "Cat in the Hat", etc. Anyway, somewhere along the line we wound up talking about sharks. It's funny how you find out what sticks with the little ones, because she launched into this whole talk about how sharks are scary and eat people, but your safe if your in a (under water) cage . I didn't want her to have nightmares so I knew I had to say something to ease her mind, so I also took the chance to try and toss a little environmental education out there.
"Sweetheart, sharks don't really like to eat people," I said
"Then how come they bite people?" she asks with that innocent little voice.
"Well, they are VERY hungry!" I told her. "You see sharks eat fish and people eat eat fish too. The problem is people are so VERY good at catching and eating fish that we aren't leaving enough for the sharks, so they are very hungry!" Okay, okay, I really have no idea if our fishing is causing the sharks problems, but it seemed like such a good chance to toss out some ideas about not hogging the planets resources
She looks up at me with the most sincere eyes you have ever seen - you know, that look that only a little critter can pull off, and says "But I will give my fish to the sharks! Let's go give the sharks some fish tomorrow!"
So my tiny little 4 year old critter, who thinks sharks are big, bad, and scary, is willing to get in a cage under the water and give the sharks some fish because she thinks its sad that the sharks are so hungry. What a kind and brave little person she is. I'm thinking we must have done something right .

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