Innocent children are the best way to stir a stubborn heart I

was chatting with Ron in a coffee shop. Amongst other things, we talked about a fall-out he’d had with his daughter almost six months ago.

Stubbornness prevented him from calling, but he missed her, and his grandchildren.

Just at that point a toddler, wandered over from a nearby table.

She indicated to Roy that she needed help zipping up her jacket.

“I didn’t think I’d been anything other than sunshine and light,” Harry told me.

But, on a visit to his son’s house, Harry’s two-year-old grandson had asked him why he was so grumpy.

Indicating his extensive dinosaur collection, the little lad said: “You need to have a good attitude, grampa.

“And if you have a good attitude the dinosaurs will have a good attitude as well.”

As so often happens, a child had a greater insight into the human condition than many adults.

Our attitudes are catching.

And, if we want to live in a happy world, the best thing to do is be happy. It’s infectious.

I shall certainly be reminding Harry of this, the next time he decides to be a grampa-saurus.

Or should that be a grump-asaurus?

“That’s odd,” her dad said, “she normally doesn’t talk to people she doesn’t know.”

Of course, Roy obliged. Then the little miss gave him a smile and blew him a big kiss before heading off with her parents.

“She’s the same age as my granddaughter,” Roy said. Suddenly teary-eyed, he added: “That’s it. I’m phoning!”

Sometimes – somehow – children just know what is needed.

The debate amongst Laura’s work-mates looked like it might take up their whole lunch-break.

Someone had asked if the words “I love you” were necessary in a relationship. Or if actions really did talk louder than words.

Adult relationships and parental relationships were discussed, and the majority seemed to think the words were more important between parents and their children, but the argument for loving actions being enough was still being put forward

“Then Myra spoke up,” Laura told me. “I think it was the first thing she said on the subject, and it brought the whole argument to a happy conclusion.

“She said, ‘If our actions are the envelope, what we wrap around people, ‘I love you’ is the stamp that makes sure the message gets delivered’.”

In the middle of winter, he saw an apple blossom spring!

Buildings and roads had steadily encroached on the “waste” ground.

The latest part had been bulldozed for a car park.

John stood beside a bulldozed embankment.

Broken sections of apple tree poked out here and there. Most of the remains of the autumn crop of apples lay in shallow, muddy puddles.

Then I looked in his cap.

“The apples are old, but there’s a dozen of them. And, deep inside of each of them, will be half a dozen seeds. That’s a decent little orchard. All it needs is time, shelter, and a helping hand.”

Time, shelter, a helping hand, and spring in our hearts… what other wonders might those things help us grow?

I sit and look around the room

So many things I see, What joy it is to catch your eye,

You’re looking back at me; Your photo on the table brings, Great comfort and sheer bliss, It helps to ease the lonely hours,

In moments such as this.