I know some folks on this site think I've been blessed with a little bit of bs, but this is really a true story.
About two weeks ago my wife, two daughters and a sister-in-law were going to go to Tyler, Texas to go shopping and I was left in charge of three grandchildren ages 5, 6 and 7. Before the ladies left they helped me get car seats put in my extended cab pick-up in case the kids and I had an ice cream alert and had to go to town.
We have a big yard and a porch around three sides of the house and the kids had a good time playing and just being kids. Late in the afternoon we all decided to make that trip to town and on the way I stopped by a young friends house. They have two children about 6 and 7 so the five children were in his front yard playing and his place is on the paved road leading to town.
Well, its real late in the afternoon and a funeral procession goes by real slow and I noticed all the kids out near the road, but they were far enough back that they were okay.
A little later cars started going back from the funeral and one real fine car stopped along the road and a gentleman in a nice suit and tie got out and came over and gave each one of the children one of those silver dollars with a womans picture on it. I can't remember her name. Anyhow, he walks over to the porch where my friend and I were sitting and explained that it was his father who had passed away and he thought it was so nice that when the funeral procession drove by that all the children stopped playing and gave a hand salute. He said that he was very touched by this act of respect to his father and that whoever had raised these children had certainly done a fine job with them.
As he left I was just beaming because I know I was instrumental in these kids being so well raised.
The kids came over and were showing us their silver dollars and we all decided that some ice cream was just the thing to spend some of that money on.
But then I got a little curious and asked the kids about the hand salute when the funeral drove by.
My seven year old grandson said "ganddaddy, we weren't saluting ... the sun was in our eyes and we couldn't see good so we put our hands up over our eyes."
I guess this was maybe the one time in their lives that shielding their eyes from the sun earned them a dollar each.