May 25, 2012 | 3:03 pm Posted by Rabbi Ilana Grinblat Who goes
first? This question is central in my household nowadays, as my
eight year old son and five year old daughter frequently argue
over who gets the first turn at everything. They debate who gets
to tell me first at dinnertime how their day was at school. To
resolve this issue, I made a chart listing the days of the week
with their names alternating as to who gets to recount their day
first. Then they argue over a flaw in the chart. They noticed
that since there are seven days of the week and two children,
one child invariably gets the first turn two days in a row. The
kids also debate who gets snuggles first at bedtime. This time,
thinking I was smarter, I made a chart of two weeks (since
fourteen days is equally divisible by two), but then they
objected that this system too was unfair, because the bedtime
chart didn’t correspond to the dinner chart. The same child
could end up talking first at dinner and receiving the first
snuggles in the same day!