today sebastian was told me how he was never going to leave home, ever. i assured him that would be cool, but shared that if he changed his mind and wanted to leave home to go to, say, summer camp or university, his dad and i would be okay with that as well.
"no!" he said in a scared voice. not the pretend scared voice that he uses when i ask him to try a new dish. but his real scared voice.
"seb," i said, and pulled him towards me. "what is it kitten? i said you can stay here for as long as you want?"
and he replied, "i never want to go to university. never."
"why not, honey? your dad went, look at the great person he is now."
"because i might get killed."
stunned silence. and he continued in his precise voice and his eyes filled up with tears.
"those people last year, they were killed by a gun and they were at university. i don’t want to go to university, i don’t want to be killed."
what do you say?
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13 Replies to “explaining what i can’t understand”
oh *hugs*! why can’t we just put them in protective bubbles and hug them and pet them and call them george? i have no idea what to say. there are a few bad people in the world. there are far, far more good people, we just have to get to know them.
You don’t have to continue the discussion at this point. One day I can take Sebbie on a tour of UBC. We can visit the Japanese Gardedens, The Aggie barns,have a cool one at the UBC pub. He will be able to see that there is a reason to go to university and it will be safe for him.
Love to all…Dad
Mmm, not much you can say now. Just wait a dozen or so years and see if things change.
Oh Wow.
(((hugs))) to Sebbie.
You could tell him that God and Mommy love him.
God is always right next to him –watching and looking out for him.
That God has a grand plan. That the God who made the stars and moon is much wiser and stonger than any bad men. You can tell him to trust that God will always be with him. That God will never give him more than the two of them can’t handle together.
Then I’d find out where he heard about it and have a serious talk!
And tell him that death is nothing to fear. Jesus is in heaven with the people who die. That’s not a scary place to be. But
Remind him that Auntie is going to University right now and she is ok.. 🙂
This is exactly why I worry so much about my husband watching the television news with the kids in earshot, and the newspaper lying around now that my kids are both reading. I want so much to protect them from the weight of knowledge of the evils in this world. Childhood innocence is short enough.
Every year on 9/11 I watch the documentaries and wonder if this is the year I should tell my girls about what happened when they were babies. But it’s still not time. It is too large, to profound for them to understand.
When we were little, how much did we hear about the wars, violence, and disasters in the world? If you were exposed at an early age, how fearful and anxious were you?
I think we really have to fight to protect our kids from all the media these days. It’s hard to do, but worth our efforts, especially when you hear a fearful declaration like Sebastian made.
Good Luck.
Wow.
This parenting is the hardest job ever, eh??
I will pray for wee little Seb. Never met him, but I could just hug the stuffing out of him!
It makes my heart ache to know that half a world away a little boy is frightened because of what happened right in our backyard. (My husband’s whole family went to VT, my husband had engineering classes in the building where the second shootings occurred, and I gave a lecture there last year…we’re about 45 mins away.)
My little fellow is way too young to know what happened but it has been a struggle with others–my best friend’s 14 year old is now scared of going to college. One person doing one horrible thing can scare so many. it angers me.
I agree with your Dad–one day Seb can take a tour and see what university is like for himself, and I imagine he will warm up to it.
ouch. i have no idea. I think at that age you just say “stay at home” and work on the rest later! wow!
Oh my! I think we all kind of feel like Seb some days.
What did you say?
That’s too sad. I love Southern Belle’s comment. It is hard to reassure our kids when, in fact, we have no guarantees at all.