In a house which becomes a home, <br />one hands down and another takes up <br />the heritage of mind and heart, <br />laughter and tears, musings and deeds. <br />Love, like a carefully loaded ship, <br />crosses the gulf between the generations. <br />Therefore, we do not neglect the ceremonies <br />of our passage: when we wed, when we die, <br />and when we are blessed with a child; <br />When we depart and when we return; <br />When we plant and when we harvest. <br />Let us bring up our children. It is not <br />the place of some official to hand to them <br />their heritage. <br />If others impart to our children our knowledge <br />and ideals, they will lose all of us that is <br />wordless and full of wonder. <br />Let us build memories in our children, <br />lest they drag out joyless lives, <br />lest they allow treasures to be lost because <br />they have not been given the keys. <br />We live, not by things, but by the meanings <br />of things. It is needful to transmit the passwords <br />from generation to generation.<br /><br />Antoine de Saint-Exupery<br /><br />http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/generation-to-generation/
