If an alien would judge the parenting skills in this country by the commercials on TV, the inevitable conclusion would be that parents don't parent at all. They simply let their kids do whatever they want.

Have you seen the mattress commercial?

Kids are playing a pirate game and decide to create waves by throwing water onto the "ship," which is the mattress.

In another commercial, kids are shooting the mattress with arrows. (Should kids really play with arrows that can penetrate a mattress like that?)

In another commercial, a mother is at a car dealership, walking around talking to a salesman and "cleaning up" after her three kids in the process as they run wild.

Perhaps everyone has heard the old tale about the race between the rabbit and the tortoise and how the slow-moving creature won the race.

I hadn't thought about the story that I heard as a child from my late father, who was making a point to me about how I should slow down and end up covering more territory or getting something done correctly the first time I did it. You know the moral part.

Sunday, Victor was out in our wooded area, taking care of business as he usually does. Only this trip was taking more time than usual. That led me to wonder if he was digging around in search of something to drag back home. It was a thought that wasn't very good at that point in time. A fast moving storm had struck last Saturday. The hard rain was blowing in sheets from one direction to another. My gauge later revealed we had received a half-inch of rain in about 15 minutes. What once had been dirt had surely turned to mud.