Traditions, start a good one.

When my husband and I turned our home into an insane asylum (we cared for over 300 troubled teenagers, 6 at a time, each needing short-term foster care),  this was our Thursday night tradition:

If you don’t keep laughing, you can’t stay strong.

Actually,  there were two traditions. The first tradition applied every night – everyone had to come to the dinner table . You didn’t have to eat, but you had to stay quietly in your seat until everyone else had finished eating.

The second tradition: Thursday night was laugh night. Every one had to contribute something to laugh about.  Two rules: No ethnic jokes but Martian jokes aloud. No dirty words.  You could pass and some nights only David and I told jokes.

The incentive to get the kids participating?  David had the well-worn and very long shaggy dog joke about a 800 pound gorilla;  he would tell…