Oh, Brandon . . .

Just a few days shy of my 8th birthday, John Hinckley, Jr. attempted to assassinate President Regan. My class wrote get well soon cards to him and sent them off to the White House. Being a little kid, I wrote (of course):

Dear President Regan, Get well soon.

Then I wrote what all little kids write when faced with penning a card to a President:

We have squirrels in our attic.

Because I guess that was what was important to me at the time and I wanted to share that with Mr. President. I don't know if I was scared of the squirrels being in the attic or if I had heard my parents discussing the squirrels, but evidently, I had squirrels on my mind.

Our class received a nice thank you card from the President, complete with the presidential seal. I had a copy of it that I kept in an autograph book, but I'm sure it's long gone or buried in my parents' attic. (Now squirrel-free.)

Brandon's fifth grade class 'adopted' a serviceman in Iraq. His name is Dan and Brandon's class wrote notes to send to him a few weeks ago. I checked Brandon's note right before bed one night. It said:

Hi Dan. My name is Brandon. I am in 5th grade. I have a dog. She is fourteen years old in human years. She is old! When I get home from school, it is my job to make sure she's still alive.

I had a few different reactions:

• One: boy, that's depressing. An old dog and he has to make sure she's still alive?

• Two: boy, his parents must be really negligent if he's the one that has to check to make sure the dog's still breathing.

• Three: boy, that's slightly embarrassing that all he wants to tell Dan in Iraq is that his dog is really old.

• Four: it's slightly funny because I did the same thing to my parents years ago with the squirrels in the attic thing.

Last week, Brandon had to write another note. This time it said:

Hi Dan. Well, my dog's still alive.

It's a work in progress. I guess it does give him something to write about for the rest of the year: Binki updates. But then again, that depends on Binki.