An ephemeral world

Morning came as moist slaps on his buttocks. He woke with a start and through the threads of early morning slime in his eyes, he checked the sea for signs. He stared at the expanse of undulating gray. Over the past few days he looked at the sea as one does a wife caught red-handed in adultery. He had always turned his gaze on the waves as a farmer might look at his patch of earth; she was his playground, his tilling ground and now she was a graveyard but not as dead as one. Another lusty tongue of brine reached under his towel to lick him. With recently learned panic he moved back using his hands to drag him away from the cool infinity that had devoured most of his village and all of his respect for her; where there is fear, respect is contrived.
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Eliminating Competition in the formative years

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Revealing the results of exams must be stopped. Exams per se are fine as they help the teachers understand how clear a particular student is about a subject. Exams also help the teacher explain to the student's parents about the progress of their ward as well as the areas where attention is required. Giving the parents a number is pointless. Were a teacher to tell the parents that their ward has scored 86 would elicit (amongst a few other reactions) a "What is the maximum?" and once they are aware of that, they would move to "So, is that good? Where does he stand in the class?" and hardly ever a "Does this mean he has understood the subject well and can apply this at various points later in his life?"
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A Child Asks...

I think I'll grow
When I get to know
What the answer is
To the questions I ask.

They are but five
Not wise not high
And counting is easy
From thumb to pinky
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When we danced...

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With all the characters set, and it is a fine feeling of a theatre director that I have now, we shall now study the ritual. I really wouldn’t want to call it that (and I have no clue what my nephew wants to call it) but for the lack of a better word. So ritual it shall be. We designed various rituals and regularly changed their forms to introduce variety for him, but this one was serendipitous.

It all began one deceptively common day with his cries, gurgles, and finally a bear hug which thrilled him more than the noisiest toys in his kitty. My sister dreamily handed him over to me. I took him out asking him about the weather and what he thought about the recent evacuation initiative in the Gaza Strip. He stuck his tongue out for both. We really need news reporters like our man here. I walked him up and down the length of our house discussing a variety of things and pausing to obtain his expert expression on them. Soon he got bored, which I believe has little to with me or my conversations but with his sense of time; matters of the world can occupy only thirty minutes of his morning.
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Who's Love?

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"Come, come Davies. One couldn't have wronged enough to be greeted thus & still roam freely on the street."
"Your father keeps me far from the streets this man walks on, Master Reggie. He bows lower to your father than to the Mayor himself. Be not deceived by his looks, I know him better than that stool, which seats him for his daily drink. He is a scoundrel of the worst kind, if there ever was one, and a nasty one at that.”
The ale seemed to set his tongue wagging a lot more than it would have back home. I gave a quick look around the place, looking for a face that was looking hard at me. Fortunately there were none.
"Worried, Master Reggie? Me thinks, you are," and before I could protest in defense,
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