Sunday’s Column – Small Things

Sep 29, 2013 by winjaw

“I know Latin.”

The first words spoken to me when I came home from work the other day.

Youngest SON of Thunder, who made that comment, had quite a smug look on his face. And I was pretty impressed. Impressed that our elementary public school was teaching kids Latin. Not that Latin is of much use anymore other than to help conjugate verbs, but it does sound cool.

“Bet you don’t know what it means” he said next. Getting a little cocky for a fourth-grader if you ask me. “And I bet you don’t know any Latin either.”

“Et tu, Brute,” I hit back.

Youngest just gave me a sort of “huh” look and quickly resumed control of the conversation.

“Sic Parvis Magna,” he said. “It’s my new motto.”

According to Eldest, it was the motto of Sir Francis Drake. For those who have forgotten their history, Drake was knighted by Elizabeth 1 and was vice-admiral of the English fleet in the 1500s. He was also the second person to circumnavigate the world, doing so in 1577 to 1580.

Yeah, I had to look it up myself. (Wikipedia can be your friend).

Youngest went on to tell me Drake had the motto inscribed on his ring, along with the date, 29th January, 1596. Friggin smart kid thank you very much. And since he still has some birthday money left over, he would like to order an “exact replica” (his words) of the ring, which he will wear on a leather rope around his neck.

And just what does Sic Parvis Magna mean? “Greatness from small beginnings.” Seriously, how cool is that? Here’s Youngest with his new motto, and a perfect one at that. Absolutely he can have that ring. I begin the whole life lesson thing about how true that motto is. You can’t knock it out of the park the first time, you learn and experiment. You start small and grow, whether it’s a business or saving money or learning sports or starting a career or …
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You get the point.

I immediately head over to the computer and somehow he knows exactly where this “exact replica” ring can be ordered. So as I’m pulling out my credit card I ask him which teacher got him hooked on Latin and a great life motto. I’m so sending roses and a big thank you note and heck, might even write a column about it.

“I learned about it from my PSP game, Uncharted,” he said.

That sound you hear – similar to a balloon deflating?

Yeah.

Apparently the hero of Uncharted, Nathan Drake, believes he is a direct descendent of Sir Francis and has somehow obtained his ancestor’s ring and is off on some adventure to …

I really don’t care at this point.

Nevertheless, I order the “exact replica” ring. It arrived in the mail and Youngest proudly wears it around his neck – as he’s playing Uncharted.

I guess I should be somewhat happy that despite the hours spent on video games, Youngest has pulled some life lesson out of all this – that he truly makes “Sic Parvis Magna” at least one of his mottos; that he understands what it truly means. Start small, grow, develop, build and build upon.

I just wish a teacher had taught him that motto rather than a video game. But in truth, it should have come from me first.