(During my fifth year in high school — age 16 or 17 — I go along on a class trip to Prague. It is quite boring and hot. At one point, we are supposed to visit a Jewish cemetery, but the teacher asks us:)

Teacher: “Do you want to go?”

(Pretty much everyone says no, and we are allowed to do some shopping. I see a trinket I want, but I want to sleep the night over it and get it the next day, as we’ll have some free shopping time then, as well. That evening, my classmates go to a bar or disco. I’m not sure, because I am the only one who returns to the hotel — I’m an oddball and not very social — and I have a good night’s rest. The next morning, I notice how almost all my classmates are hungover, silent, sleepy… and the teacher is furious! It turns out that some of my classmates got so drunk, they banged on several doors in the hotel, including the teachers’, and the bus driver that would have to take us home that afternoon. Turns out I’m a deep sleeper; I didn’t notice a thing. The teacher is so furious, he yells at us all and the free shopping time is cancelled. We’ll go visit the Jewish Cemetery and then head home. I know it is of no use to argue and resign myself to not being able to get the trinket — I had decided to get it after all — for my dad. When we reach the cemetery, it turns out to be a Jewish holiday and it is closed. We get free shopping time instead, and I hurry to the shop where I saw the trinket. When home, I give the glass globe to my dad, who suddenly falls silent and says with misted eyes:)

Dad: “How did you know?”

Me: “Know what?”

Dad: “When I was born, there was a globe on my birth announcement. I always wanted to travel the world, but couldn’t.”

(I didn’t know what to say, but I realized that if it hadn’t been a Jewish holiday, I couldn’t have given this gift to my dad. It might be more than silly, but to me, it felt like divine intervention. And for those who wonder: since I moved out, he has taken my mom to Egypt and Costa Rica, so he’s a tiny globetrotter after all.)

My sibling is genderfluid — they alternate between identifying as male and female — and visits occasionally. This time, my son decided to ask me why his uncle/aunt changes gender every time we see them, so I tell him “they’re genderfluid.”

Later, when I looked at my grocery list before I went out, I saw that my son had added “gender fluid” to the list. Upon questioning why he wrote this down, I learned that he’d thought gender fluid was an actual liquid — like windshield fluid — and if you run out you get stuck as the opposite gender forever. He thought my sibling kept switching from male to female because theirs was running low, and wanted to help out.

Of course, I immediately explained what it really meant more thoroughly.

(My mother calls me on my 50th birthday.)

Mother: “Lord, honey, you’re old! How’d you get to be so old?”

Me: “You know, I haven’t decided what nursing home I’m going to put you in yet!”

(My daughter, one day shy of two years old, puts a quarter in her mouth.)

Me: “Spit that out! Spit that out!”

(I reached for her face, about to stick my hand in her mouth. She opened her hand, revealing the quarter, and just smirked at me.)

(I’m at a Renaissance fair. I’m standing in line for the bathrooms with two parents and their sons behind me. I’m dressed in full fantasy clothing — as are most visitors to the festival — while they are clearly happy civilian visitors to our weird little world. The oldest, about twelve, draws a small handcrafted dagger out of his belt. He’s clearly admiring the work of the blacksmith and not wielding it in a dangerous fashion.)

Son: “This is the start of something wonderful.”

Father: “Oh? Like what?”

Son: “Like a collection. I want one at every fair.”

Mother: “Really? We’ll have to see about that.”

Father: “Let’s just see if we will come back next year.”

Me: “Could be worse. Could be drugs.”

Son: “See?”

(I hope I run into them again next year!)