Eyes that see the good in things: August 6, 2018

It’s been awhile since I’ve shared a story like this one. You may have seen it on Facebook or one of many other media outlets that covered it. Thirteen-year-old Haylie Wenke, her friend Ashley Dayton and her 6-year-old brother Raegan were biking home from a nearby park in Aurora, Colo., when they spotted a wallet underneath a car in Jamie Carlton’s driveway.

The wallet not only contained the owner’s personal identification and credit cards, but it also contained $700 in cash. The possibilities of three kids finding that much money could have had a couple of different endings, but what they decided to do was caught on Carlton’s porch light surveillance camera.

“We found your wallet outside of your car,” Haylie said after the automated camera’s voice function asked the visitors to leave a message for the homeowner. “And we just thought we’d give it back to you, so I’m just going to put it over here, so no one takes any money.”

Carlton posted the security video footage to Facebook, and since then, the kids’ actions have gone viral. “If this doesn’t renew or at least refresh your faith in humanity, you need help,” Carlton wrote in the caption on his post. “These kids are amazing, we would love to find them to reward them and thank them. Their parents should be so proud of them.”

The kids’ aunt in South Dakota saw the post and put Drake’s dad in touch with their parents. However, the kids have had a little trouble understanding why their act was generating so much positive attention.

“If we stole the money we would get arrested,” six-year-old Reagan Wenke said. “And I already have money…in my piggy bank.”

But Haylie told WCNC, the local television station, that temptation never really came into play for the kids.

“It wasn’t our money, so we just gave it back,” she told the station. “If you see something that someone left or dropped, always give it back and do the right thing.”

The wallet actually belonged to Carlton’s son, Nigel Drake, who dropped it while carrying other things into the house.

“It gives you faith in humanity a little bit that there are good kids out there,” Drake told the local news station. “These kids’ parents are raising them the right way.”

The owner of the wallet talked about the parents who were raising those kids right. Although most parents work hard to teach their kids to do the right thing, sometimes some of those bigger conversations are not easy ones to have or are not easily brought up.

Parent Map magazine recommended an unexpected strategy to help: Watch a movie.

Here’s a partial list of films they’ve provided with powerful stories of kids championing everything from gender equality to ethical treatment of animals.

• Pixie Hollow Games: Two very different characters learn to work together and other stories in the series teach lessons about valuing the work everyone does and getting to know people before deciding what you think about them. Ages 4+

• Dear Dumb Diary: Based on a tween novel, any child who has begun trying to find their place in school will identify with the protagonist’s search for a way to stand out. Ages 6+

• Separate Is Never Equal: You will have to go to the library to find this short documentary about Sylvia Mendez, the young Latina who desegregated schools in California a decade before Brown vs. Board of Education. Ages 6+

• Free Willy: A huge hit when it came out, this story of a young boy rescuing an orca from captivity is ready for a new generation. Use it not only to talk about ethical treatment of animals but to introduce the current challenges facing our most iconic local wildlife. Ages 6+

• Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone: OK, so this one is obvious but that doesn’t make it any less good! Harry Potter standing up to the dark wizard Voldemort is the main conflict, of course, but there are examples of everyday heroism throughout the eight-part movie series. Ages 7+

• The Eagle Huntress: This documentary narrated by Daisy Ridley of The Force Awakens fame is about a 13-year-old Kazakh girl who bucks generations of male-only tradition to hunt with eagles. The premise of a girl entering a male-dominated field sounds straightforward, but the telling is so exquisite it’s hard to believe it’s really a documentary. Ages 8+ *Note that while this is an excellent film, it is spoken in its original language with subtitles.

• He Named Me Malala: This documentary shares the famous story of Malala Yousafzai, the Pakistani teenager who stood up to the Taliban for the right to an education, won a Nobel Prize. Ages 12+

• Girl Rising: Famous narrators from around the world including Cate Blanchett and Amitabh Bachchan share the true stories of nine girls fighting for an education. Ages 12+

• The Power of One: This powerful movie about fighting for change follows an orphaned English boy through a rough childhood in Afrikaner-controlled South Africa. When a college scholarship gives the teen a chance to escape hardship, he must choose whether to go to England or stay with his childhood friends and fight apartheid. Ages 13+

• If You Build It: A high school shop class in a depressed Southern community builds a farmer’s market that sparks new businesses in this documentary that is as much about alternative education techniques as it is about design. Ages 13+

I think I am going to watch a few of these. The messages sound like good conversation starters…and that’s a good thing.

We would love to share local stories about the good things your eyes are seeing.

Stop in to share your stories with us, give us a call at 947-2417 or e-mail us at [email protected]. Or send a letter to Eyes That See the Good in Things, c/o Allison Lindgren, The Transcript, 6 8th St N., New Rockford, ND 58356.