Two Big Boys
Ty started asking questions. What is gravity? Where did the Earth come from? Who made the Sun? Why do stars explode? Why did the astronauts die? We don’t want to lie to him. But we don’t want to confuse him. I’m sure that he can understand a supernova, but way, way, way, way down at the bottom of the unknown is the issue of what is not known. And it would be much easier to tell him, “God did that.” But that would be a cop-out.
He is also about to lose his bottom teeth. Unfortunately, we have been telling him that if he doesn’t brush his teeth, his teeth will fall out. So a week ago, he showed me that one of his teeth felt funny. I checked and smiled, “You’re going to lose your tooth.” He furrowed his brow the way Dad does when he hears something unpleasant. I chuckled, “No, no, Ty. See. That’s what is supposed to happen. You have milk teeth for a few years, and they fall out to make room for your grown-up teeth.” He still wasn’t buying it. But after a few nights of checking the wiggle in his tooth and discovering that the neighboring tooth was wiggling also, he became a little less apprehensive losing his teeth. With the help of anatomy books and Dr. Google, he understands that this “losing his teeth” is not what we were talking about when we mention that he’ll lose his teeth if he doesn’t brush them.
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I am so pregnant, I want to cry.
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Kyle pretends to be Uther Pendragon. He climbs on the arm of the couch (that’s his horse) and holds his foam sword high above him. “Do you yield?” he screams to the imaginary knights across the room river. “Yield to Excalibur, and you shall have the lands from here to the sea.” He later pretends that he is dying. He crawls with his sword along the couch, groaning as he gets on his feet. “Nobody shall wield Excalibur…. but ME!” And he plants the sword deep in crevices of the couch – which is supposed to be the stone from which Arthur will draw the sword many years later (in case you don’t know the story). Kyle then falls to the ground and dies. He gets back on his horse and sings Carl Orff’s “O Fortuna” as he, now as King Arthur, prepares for battle against Mordred and his army. All the while, I pretend to be staring at the window. If I take a direct look at him, he’ll stop and tell me to mind my own business.
