Everything They Know

The Pony has been in a writing frenzy lately. He was pounding the laptop during our trip to the bank this morning. For some reason he was researching lasers, and sharing facts about red and blue laser beams with me.

To keep up my end of the conversation, I shared that yesterday, after we saw the bad striping job done by the highway department, I actually came upon two of the striping trucks. I had left The Pony at his grandma's house while she and I went catting around. "Remember how those lines were too narrow, leaving a big section of pavement at the edge of the road? Well, those trucks were only driving about 10 mph, and they were not even striping at the time. The lane was so narrow that the highway trucks that painted the stripes could hardly fit between them. I think that qualifies as irony. Doesn't it? I never could understand what that meant."

"Like a crab, you were not born with an innate sense of irony. At least according to SpongeBob."

I had to laugh. "Believe it or not, that's not the first time I've been compared to a crab."

Maybe I should write one of those All I Really Need to Know I Learned in Kindergarten books about my boys' education. I could call it Everything They Know They Learned From Cartoons.

When the #1 son was not even in preschool yet, he told me something was a mirage. "Wait a minute. Do you even know what that is? A mirage?"

"Uh huh. Something you see that's not there. I saw it on Scooby Doo. He was in the desert and saw a lake, but when he got there it was just sand." Yeah. #1 has always been advanced in the vocabulary department. His Parents As Teachers contact said he talked like a little adult.

Another day, #1 asked if I had ever been to the moon. "No. I haven't been to the moon. I don't have a rocket, and I'm not an astronaut."

"Mom. All you need is a rope and a tree. You bend over the tree, tie it down with a rope, get on it, and cut the rope. Then you go to the moon. I saw it on Looney Tunes."

If only life, and the concept of irony, were so simple.