Good morning

I have vivid memories of my grandparents during their annual summer visits. Even then, they had already slowed with age and awoke well after we did. We tried to read quickly through the important parts of the newspaper (the front page, the Ask Ann Landers column, the photos in the sports section, and the comics) before the adults used their seniority to take it from us or to spread their business section over our precious Calvin and Hobbes.

Those days back then were before I learned to respect my grandparents. The low-sodium ketchup they put on vegetables disgusted me. The little-old-lady perfume wafting in the hallways and lingering in the powder room was suffocating, not familiar and endearing, as it now is. The impromptu history quizzes (You don't know what happened on December 7, 1941? How could you not know!? What kind of school are you at, anyway? Um, elementary school?) induced squirms. The much-dreaded check on our progress in playing musical instruments induced tears.

One morning, Grandpa and Grandma, wrapped in robes, shuffled down the long hallway from the guest room to the kitchen and living room. Grandpa was not a morning person and, combined with his general venerable scariness, I tried to make myself invisible. Good morning, he barked. Silence. Hi Grandpa, I replied. Hi!? What kind of greeting is that? You don't say Hi. You say Good Morning. Grandma jumped in to assuage the reprimand. Oh, Carrie, sweetheart, Good Morning is just a nicer way to greet someone. *Gulp* Got it. Lesson learned. Say Good Morning.

This memory popped into my head this morning, over twenty years later, as I walked into school with a classmate. Good Morning, I said. How did this classmate respond? What up. *Raised Eyebrow* What up? Who says that? Even my 5 year old Hi is a more pleasant slang greeting than the rude "What up." Does this guy still say that to his grandparents? While I never disagreed with my Grandparents, I think I finally appreciate just how lovely it is to hear Good Morning.


Say simply, very simply, with hope -- Good Morning.
Maya Angelou