Crucial conversations

It's funny how much of this 'parenting' gig happens in the odd moments, the off hours. Today while dropping him off at school, we had this gem:

Me, as I'm hugging Jared: "I'm going to squeeze the love right out of you!"
Jared: "No! I want the love to stay inside me!... is there more love inside me?"

And then last night while tucking him in for bed, we had one of "The Conversations": death. We started out talking about how daddy's mommy was Safta, and Safta's mommy was Bubbe... "Who is Bubbe's mommy?" lead to a discussion of how she wasn't around anymore, which lead to "Am I going to die someday?" (how do you answer a three year old asking that question?!?) which lead to a discussion about how when people have had really long happy lives they die.

I felt so guilty that I might be messing him up forever at that point, so I then mentioned that "some people believe" they go to a place called heaven where you're happy all the time, but he did seem satisfied with my answers up until that point anyway.

Comments

[Jen]

Hmmm messing him up forever? And how! What do you do when he finds out that some people die and they didnt get the long and happy life? Geez parenting sure is a maze of tarpits aint it?