Lately, I’ve been questioning my son’s sense of reality. The line between what’s true and what’s not is becoming dangerously thin. I’m not referring to lying about whether you’re guilty of something (“No, I did not throw the toothpaste on the roof”) because we’ve grown more or less accustomed to that.
Grandiose statements, like “I am going into the yard and kill ten tigers” are also not the problem. After all, he is a little boy, and little boys feel an insatiable need to beat on things, even if those things are imaginary.
Every parent knows that conversations with children can turn surreal. However, sometimes they go completely off the map. I recently had the following conversation with my child:
Mendel: “Mom, when I grow up, can I marry a fish?”
Me: “Why on earth would you want to marry a fish?”
Mendel: “I want to marry you, too.”
Me: “Stay on topic. Why a fish?”
Mendel: “I like fish.”
Me: “You like to eat fish. That’s an entirely different thing.”
Mendel: “But you marry who you like. I want to marry a fish.”
Me: “How do you see this happening?”
Mendel: “We get married.”
Me: “And then what?”
Mendel: “The fish marries me, and I marry the fish. Then we are married.”
Me: “Yes, I think we’ve established the marriage part. It won’t be legal, though.”
Mendel: “What?”
Me: “I don’t think you can. Marry a fish, I mean. It’s not allowed.”
Mendel: “Why?”
Me: “It just isn’t. You have to marry a person.”
Mendel: “No, I want to marry a fish.”
Me: “How do you know if the fish wants to marry you? They don’t talk.”
Mendel: “I’ll just know.”
Mendel is four years old, and doesn’t have the faintest clue what marriage is. I think he just liked the word, and decided to use it in a sentence. Kind of like when he tells strangers at the supermarket random things they have absolutely no interest in. Maybe he just likes to hear himself talk, or enjoys the look on my face when he says: “I have to tell you something.”
My hope is that these conversations at some point turn into real talks about real things, and that for now, he just needs to practice the art of conversational volleyball. For now, I’m keeping a notepad handy, so I’ll be able to recall these wonderful exchanges for when he’s older. When he is in his thirties, and brings home someone he actually wants to spend his life with, I’m totally bringing up the fish story.
Comments