Would You Like a Baby Climbing out of an Ice Skate?

Down in the Lower School (PreK-5th grade) of the Quaker school where I spend my days, the kids get stickers from their teachers pretty regularly.  By Middle School, though, they're far too sophisticated for stickers.

One of my jobs is to arrange for the diplomas.  I start in the fall because I like to get my order in early.  Do you know how hard it is to get 60 to 80 18-year-olds to drop by the office to tell me their middle names?  And then to come back and confirm that what is printed on the order form is accurate?

I thought you might.

But it turns out that by the age of eighteen, kids are pretty much sticker-deprived.  They haven't received any for ever, or so it seems. And their faces light up when one is offered!   So I keep a little box of assorted stickers on my desk.  It's fun.  I'll find out that some great big soccer player's middle name is "Patrick" and then I'll peer into my sticker box and say to him, "Would you like a googly monster with blue arms OR would you like a baby sitting on a watermelon?"  Oh!  The indecision!  And it turns out he can't resist the baby sitting on the watermelon.  Other kids will notice the sticker (some put it on their shirt, others on their hands) and inquire and then in they come.  And that pretty girl whose middle name is Rose will walk away smiling over the frog wearing a waistcoat.  I've been at it a week, now and am about two-thirds done.

I once had to offer a sticker to a faculty member who just had the worst time remembering to bring back his signed contract (talk about the absent-minded professor) and now it's become required.  Faculty and staff get them, also, for turning in their emergency forms.  Or for making me laugh.  I love it.  And they love it.

Who knew?

Tomorrow I just might offer the calculus teacher a pug dog sitting in a teacup.  And he'll be utterly delighted.