Sometimes the tasks involved in being a parent aren't that apparent at all.....and recently there have been several occasions in which the boy has asked questions that make me clutch my chest and then fall over DEAD.TO.DEATH.
The other night while he was in the tub he yells, "Mom, what is playing doctor?"
Cut to me springing from the sofa, clutching my chest and hyperventalating, but muttering in the calmest voice I can muster, "Doctor?".......
Boy: Yeah, all the kids in my class have played it, but I don't know what it is...
Me: It's a game? Doctor? Have you seen this doctor game?
Boy: No, but you like take things out of the game....
ME: OPERATION!? OPERATION! Are you talking about Operation?
Boy: Oh Yeah! Operation.
Me: You've played operation. You had Shrek Operation.
Boy: I would like to play operation again.
Me: Yes! Yes, we will play it sometime soon. Operation!
And then I died. Eyes wide as saucers and overjoyed at the fact that I didn't have to explain "Doctor" to my eight year old son, I flopped back on the sofa over joyed at the bullet that I had just dodged. Ahhhhh. Score one for the parents!
This morning while getting ready for school he asks, "Mom, what is a rapier?" Ha! I have read enough Tolkien in my days to know the answer to this one....nice try kid. Instead of giving him the answer I told him to go get his Dictionary.....
He got to the "R's" and made his way closer to rapier, and LUCKY ME! what comes right before rapier? Rape. He sounds it out..Ra-eh-p. Then "Mom, what is rape?" Rather than have him read the definition, I snatch the dictionary and tell him "To rape is to take something without asking....but in a major way. Oh! Here is rapier! It is a small narrow, double edged sword. Tah Dah! Rapier! Now go brush your teeth."
I stood quietly in his room for a minute after he left and allowed myself the realization that this.....these questions....are only the very tip of the iceberg and that if I didn't ready myself, my head may very well explode by the time he is 10.
Someone needs to write an "Adolescence for Dummies" book.
10 comments:
Glad you are there first....
This week we covered what soldiers do/are.... are they good guys or bad guys he wants to know. What about Indiana Jones... is he a good guy or a superhero? Last but not least... why would people want bigger fake boobs?
Oh man, those are hard. Maybe we need to collaborate on a book or questions and answers....
What's your phone number? I'll stick with "Ask Amber, she'll know".
Meanwhile, I hear the word "doctor" and scramble to mute all other sounds in the room, preparing my brain how to back up your improvised speech.
We briefly had to explain "why would people want to steal kids?" I didn't like that one.
Oh my god...I blocked that out!
How did you answer the "why would people want to steal kids?" question?
We told him that there are people in the world who are mentally ill and kidnap people and a lot of the time, hurt them. We tried to turn the conversation around and make it more about being aware of your surroundings and not talking to strangers.
"And it's not the whole world; we don't want you to be afraid of everything..."
We've been watching a lot of Discovery channel lately, and they inevitably go into how this animal makes babies. Complete with animal hibbitty jibbitty.
At the aquarium the other day the boy felt the need to point out the male and female sharks and their genitals to anyone who would listen.
*this or that animal
Grammar! I shake my fist at you.
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