“When grandparents enter the door, discipline flies out the window.” –Ogden Nash

It was Grandparents Day at Maria and Christian’s school on Wednesday. I like Grandparents Day. Everyone is just so doggone happy to be there. Every grandparent is beaming. Every kid is proud as punch. “This is my grandpa!” they’ll say, like maybe you couldn’t figure that out. The hugs, the kisses, the handholding. For boomers, it’s a little like Woodstock but without the sex and drugs.

You’d be hard-pressed to find a bigger gathering of adults who couldn’t care less about discipline than on Grandparents Day. Not our job. During a musical assembly that lasted about 45 minutes, I never saw one person frown, shush or tell a kid to stop doing anything. This is unheard of when parents are around. Yet in the face of obvious misbehavior, grandparents will stare straight ahead, oblivious and happy.

Christian got hold of two magnetic chip clips and spent the entire assembly sticking them to the seats in front of us and clipping them to various spots on our clothes. I saw no reason why he shouldn’t. Maria and her friend Maddy, who were sitting between Maddy’s grandma and me, played a hand-clapping game in time to the music. It was obvious that Maddy’s grandma had no intention of telling them to stop. I know I didn’t.

We visited their classrooms and saw their desks (cleaned for the occasion), looked at textbooks, oohed over artwork, drank juice and ate sandwiches and cookies. But mostly we just marveled at the talent, imagination and resourcefulness of grandchildren. Really, it’s hard to know what there is for their parents to find fault with.

“The idea that no one is perfect is a view commonly held by people with no grandchildren.”  –Doug Larson