the innocence of youth

On the walk home from school today, Liam told me he had five dollars in his backpack. When I asked him where he got it, he told me his friend Sarah had given it to him. When I asked him why, he looked at me like I was asking something crazy and said, "So we can be rich." And then he ran off ahead of me and I forgot the conversation until we got home he immediately began rummaging around in his pack for the money.

"Dad," he breathlessly greeted Andrew. "Me and Sarah and Tristan are going to be rich!"

"How are you doing that?" Andrew asked.

Very matter of factly, he replied, "We're making money. With paper." And that was that.

Following Sarah's lead, Liam spent the next hour making money in all kind of denominations and then made a box to put his bills in, labeled "Liams Brtend Mone." (Liam's Pretend Money) He's a generous boy. I'm hoping he'll let me borrow the $10,000 bill.

:::

A couple nights ago I was reading to Liam about Noah's Ark out of a page-a-day Bible story book. Because the story was so tightly paraphrased, it read very bluntly (i.e., the people were wicked, God wiped them out, except for faithful Noah and his family). I cringe at these kinds of simplified Bible stories and tried to prepare myself for the questions Liam would have. When we got to the end, I read the predictable questions that were printed in the book.

"Honey," I said. "Why did God send the flood?"

Liam looked at me like the question was a no-brainer and shrugged his shoulders.

"So the ark would float," he said.

:::

On the way home from the grocery store this afternoon, Liam declared that he needed to use the bathroom and I told him we were almost home and asked if he could wait. He sighed and said yes.

About a minute later I heard him mutter, "I don't understand why we can't just pee in our pants."