i have a toddler who doesn’t say “please” or “thank you.” (there are also a lot of other words, thousands even, that he doesn’t say, like “nebula” and “omphaloskepsis” and “mom”.) when a well-mannered adult would say “please” or “thank you,” henry says, “now.” he has a whole slew of these phrases lately: more trucks now, more cookies now, i want cookies now, cook cookies now, etc. this seems like a necessary phase in toddlerhood, but it has me wondering….
as a child my mother taught me to write thank you notes. anytime we received anything we sat down with a pen and a piece of paper and wrote thank you.
it’s now a permanent habit of adulthood, i write thank you notes. i write them on real paper. i put them in real envelopes. i stick on a real stamp. and i send the note through the U.S. postal service.
am i a dying breed? lately, it seems that i rarely receive thank you notes for gifts i’ve carefully chosen–and beyond that, i don’t even get a phone call or an email or a wall post or a text or a little scroll of paper tied to a pigeon’s leg. it’s not that i believe all acts of kindness should be heralded, it’s that i believe that saying “thank you” is essential to our humanity. (weren’t there those ten lepers in the bible…?)
so, what say you? am i crazy to expect mail? how do you express appreciation? how are you teaching your children to say thank you?
you can bet your buttons that henry has watched me write thank you notes. and you can bet again that as soon as he can sign his name, he’ll be using his signature to send love and gratitude. i just hope he isn’t the only one.
I think it’s funny when I prompt Henry to say please or thank you (depending on the situation) and then he says “more” instead. Not sure how that’s connected. But it’s cute.
Well, I will confess that I am a non-thank-you-note-writer. Every time I give someone a gift and they don’t send me a thank you note, I rejoice because I feel less guilty for all the thank you notes I didn’t send. There are a few reasons for my thank-you-note deficiency. As wonderful as my parents are, it’s not something that was instilled in me growing up, so I easily forget that I’m supposed to do it. I also can’t ever seem to get it together enough to send thank you notes, even when I really want to. I may buy the cards, but I never finish writing them. Or I may write them, but I never manage to address, stamp, or send them. It’s not an intentional thing, it just sort of happens, the same way my floor never seems to get mopped even though I’d really like it to be clean. And I suppose to some degree, I don’t write thank you notes as often as I should for actual, specific reasons related to the convention of thank you notes specifically, but perhaps those reasons are really just excuses to make me feel better about my rude behavior…. I will say that I do make an effort to thank people for their gifts in other ways, in person, on the phone, or by email. I hope that makes it better somehow. And my children absolutely do say please and thank you. (Well, Evan says please and thank you; Caleb signs please but is still working on thank you.)
But good for you for writing thank you notes and teaching your children to write them. Though I do think it’s a dying custom, especially with actual paper, ink, stamps, and the U.S. Mail, your kids will be better and more grateful for the lesson, however few thank you notes they receive in return.
I agree with you 100%. And yet I am in the shameful camp of a non-thank-you-note-writer. I mean, I do write them. Sometimes. It’s one of those things I feel relentlessly guilty about. Like working. And not getting the laundry done. I think my face is actually turning red as I write this.
I probably owe you one too, huh?
I’m only okay at writing thank you notes…do you do it for Christmas presents and birthday presents? I don’t…but shower gifts or when someone has brought a meal over, sure. As for Jacob…he’s actually very good at saying please & thank you. He’s probably better at thank you than please, but I’ll take what I can get. I hate to be whoever you’re expecting a note in the mail from! (hehe)
hmm…so many good thoughts jess.
first of all, do not despair in henry. it is his age. keep prompting the “please’s, and the thank you’s”. i have a strong desire for my kids to be polite. but lucy is 4, and she is polite, and i still have to prompt her almost every day, and say those nice little words myself. abby is a little stinker at this age, and i hold out sometimes for the please until i give it to her. he he.
secondly, this world’s degenerating value’s of courtesy and customs is so scary to me. i’m picky though. when invitations come in the mail and the bride and the groom announce their own wedding, and print on the invitation where they want you to buy their presents. ugh. what happened to the double envelope (ok, conservancy) and the “mr. and mrs. are pleased to announce” and “you are cordially invited to a reception held in their honour” honor, with a U! now, it’s like “Hey, we’re getting hitched, see this picture of us making out where you can’t even see our faces? come bring us a gift. oh, and here are our parents’ names at the bottom.
okay, so i’m ranting. but control what you can: the pleases, and the please may I’s, and the thank you’s, and no thank-you’s. and the thank you cards, don’t ever give up! henry is going to be one well mannered little lad in no time.
O yes. I agree. Julia is actually really good about saying thank you and please, only because she knows she can get what she wants by saying it. Along with her kind words are plenty of spoiled behaviors but I’ll take what I can get.
And yes I am a pen and ink thank you letter writer myself. Believe it or not my husband is even more vigilant about thank you notes then I am. Its important. So are phone calls. Thanks for the chat this morning.
Inside my desk drawer is a plastic envelope with 10 thank you notes I wrote to people after Craig and I got married. Our 6th anniversary is March 14 (tomorrow!). On the top is one for Spencer and Karina, because I didn’t have their address at the time. It is sealed and I have absolutely no idea what I wrote, but I am inspired to send it on it’s way. Better late than never?
You continue to be my inspiration in writing, letters, blogs, and many thanks.
I write thank you notes. I wrote one for every person that gave me a baby present. I wrote them when Lucy was 3 weeks old and crying every second she was awake and I hadn’t showered in 10 days and everything hurt and I broke down in tears and assumed the fetal position every 1.5 days. I sat down at the kitchen table and wrote little cards to people thanking them for the pink booties and the diaper pails and the baby aspirin. i couldn’t stop myself.