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CRUZ |
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'Maturity' in a 6-year-old
can be kind of intimidating
of TheColumnists.com
It’s common to hear mothers saying of their children, “They grow up so fast!” And indeed, as the holidays approach and my six-year old boy has taken charge of the season, I am reminded that it does seem like only yesterday that he was a yearling and his father was holding him up to place the star on the top of the Christmas tree.
Now holding him up would be back-breaking work, we can hardly keep up with the notches on the growth chart, his feet are only two centimeters smaller than mine, and explaining Santa and the meaning of Christmas has been a challenge.
I knew it was the end of the innocence when my son came home from his first day of summer camp this year, his eyes widened and he proudly held up his middle finger and said, “Mom, you should never do this; it’s a swear!”
Besides being surprised that he had apparently not noticed the times I had waved it around in the car, I was even more surprised that this is what he was learning at camp. This, and the song about Yankee Doodle sticking a feather in his butt and calling it Hershey’s chocolate. I guess that is when I realized that, at camp, he was doing his growing up.
Where I would drag him into public ladies’ rooms with me rather than let him venture into the men’s room alone, it dawned on me that at camp he would be going to the men’s room by himself. It was going to be impossible for me to watch over him at all times.
Again he recently surprised me when we
were hanging around the house and the show "Desperate Housewives"
was on in the background. He passed by and
exclaimed, “Oh, no, don’t tell me they’re going
to have sex.” So many things ran through my mind at
that moment, from, “When did Carlos and Gabby get back
together?” to, “How in the world did Sebastian
find out about sex?” It must have been previously on
"Desperate Housewives."
The topic came up again when I drove my son and his best friend to the place where we were holding my six-year old’s birthday party. From the back seat I could hear giggles and the spelling out of “s-e-x” and “w-o-o w-o-o”.
And last week, when he said he didn’t want to wear one of his favorite shirts and I asked him why not, he said, “I dunno. I guess it’s just not my style any more”.
He runs away when I chase him around threatening him with kisses, kisses that he used to accept affectionately that now frankly gross him out.
As Christmas approaches, we have been discussing things such as presents and Santa regularly. Among his Christmas wishes, an iPod and an iPhone.
In one discussion he said quite matter-of-factly, “I know that there is no Santa, that you sneak out on Christmas Eve and go to Target and buy me all my presents while I’m asleep. I know that you are the Tooth Fairy and the Easter Bunny, too. Trevor told me.”
He had caught me off guard, but I managed
to reply, “Some people choose
not to believe, but I believe,” and left it at that.
And then, a few days later, he asked if I’d mailed Santa his list yet.
I guess he decided to stay a kid at least a little longer.
©2009 by Raphaëlla Cruz. The cartoon is from IMSI's Master Clips Collection, 1895 Francisco Blvd. East, San Rafael, CA, 94901-5506, USA. This column first posted Dec. 7, 2009.
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