Old soul

So when people say this about children I'm always thinking of wisdom and gentleness and an awareness of the world around and a sensitivity to others and all those kind of good things.

With perhaps the merest overtone of 'was probably Gandhi in a past life'.

But when the Noodle comes out with comments like, 'eh, there'll be five thousand people in the queue for the movie' or 'oh, that's a nice cardigan' or 'why don't we just stay home, we didn't plan to go out today' or 'she should put some more clothes on, that young missy*', I think he has an old soul all right. He has the old soul of a grumpy old Nana. And yes, he does like scones.

*Oh all right, I made up that last one, but it's the same tone, it's all in the tone you know. Oh, and while I'm adding notes, it's also difficult to find a person from history who was not famous for doing something horrendous or stupid. Or is that just me? My first thought was Aethelred the Unready, for reasons that remain happily buried in my subconscious. My second was Queen Margaret who was married to King Malcolm in Scotland at the time William the Conqueror invaded England, which tends to indicate that I'm thinkng chronologically. Except then I thought of Governor Macquarie. Who may well have been a perfectly decent person, probably, but you know, not landmarkish enough for my point. I mean, who would want to be a governor of Australia in their past life? It's ridiculous to even contemplate. And then various tyrants and mass-murderers popped into my brain. Irritating. So Gandhi was a compromise. Perhaps I meant Jane Austen all along.