THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Saturday, December 2, 1995 TAG: 9512020025
SECTION: FRONT PAGE: A12 EDITION: FINAL
TYPE: Letter
LENGTH: Short : 37 lines
Regarding Bettie McMoran's ``Pumpkin perspective'' (letter, Nov. 20): Let's not be so hasty to criticize the Larchmont Civic League president's comments regarding the pumpkins and the children's attachment to them. Selecting the right one, designing a face and helping to carve the creation is a large investment for a young child. How can we then expect the child to have sufficient detachment and be philosophical enough to say ``Well, it was only a pumpkin'' when someone steals it? To young children, it was more than the theft of a hefty vegetable; it was something in which they had placed some creative investment.
Ms. McMoran set forth the idea that Larchmont might better serve the community by spending the pumpkin money on food for the hungry. I challenge her to find a higher concentration of families anywhere in Hampton Roads that have more community involvement and leadership.
Additionally, there is not a school, public or private, nor a church or synagogue anywhere in Norfolk that does not participate in regular campaigns to help the less fortunate at this and other times of the year. Consequently, the children (some of the same ones who had their pumpkins taken) have ample opportunities to practice ``caring, compassion and love'' firsthand.
If we expect our children to possess these praiseworthy emotions during the holidays, let's not be critical if they show a child's remorse when something of theirs is taken.
EVAN B. Van LEEUWEN
Norfolk, Nov. 20, 1995 by CNB