Genetics and Super Powers

There are things about each of my boys that I can pick out and say - That's me. Or, That's David. A trip to the grocery store the other day had me pinpointing Cal's inherited traits pretty clearly:

He put California rolls, dark chocolate truffles and purple tulips into the cart and credibly talked me into each one of them. My child.

(The tulips were especially precious, because he spotted them first thing when we walked in the door and I told him that they would get crushed in the cart, but we could pick them up right before we checked out. He disappeared partway through our shopping only to reappear a minute later with the tulips cradled in his arms: "I will hold them just like this and they won't get crushed. That way no one else can buy them before we get done. And we can take them to our house and put them in the window so they will bloom and bloom.")

Riding in the car home from the grocery store, he asked after some quiet minutes, "Mom, when you turn off a light, where does the electricity for that light go?" Now, have I ever thought of that? No. Do I know? No. Have I ever cared to know? Actually, not really. David's child.

(I told him he would have to ask his dad about that one. So we called David when we got home and I heard Cal ask, and David's answer apparently provoked a follow-up question, "And what if all the lights in the house are off? Where does all the electricity from all those lights go?")

So, the summary of genetic manifestation in Calvin: Inclinations toward the delicious, fattening, aesthetic or sentimental - Me. Inclinations toward acquiring unprecedented amounts of information and knowledge on how or why everything and everyone does what they do - David.

***

A question that has surfaced a few times in the past couple weeks which David has handed over to me for the answering is, "How does the baby get out?"

I don't really have a problem answering these kinds of things, and long ago determined to be as up front and clear about answering questions like this in an age appropriate manner whenever my kids are asking. But I've put off this discussion for a bit because of visions in my head that my knowledge-imparting (David's child) four-year-old will share everything he knows about the birth canal to his Primary class at church just as the room gets really quiet...

Anyway, the subject was covered today because he caught the last bit of A Baby Story on TLC. I kinda did it on purpose, letting him see that. Maybe not the best strategy, but he's my first child and keeps asking, so I know he needs to know. And he took it all in stride, without an excessive amount of shock or disgust or whatever I was expecting. He actually seemed fairly impressed.

Which is why he needed to share the info at dinner with his Dad, who he knows enjoys great and interesting pieces of knowledge. So as we were finishing talking about the opening that mommies have that stays really small until the baby has grown big enough to be born and then it opens up to let the baby out, he concluded excitedly, "And then the lady counts to ten lots of times and the baby just comes out!" Yep. "Babies are pretty messy when they're first born. But they're so cute and tiny!" A little pause, then, "But how come only mommies get to have babies? What do men get to do?"

Now THAT is a question that unfortunately few people have ever posed or really considered. I love how my boy thinks, and that he really made me understand in a moment that being a woman and being able to have a baby is one of the most powerful, priceless and precious gifts of life.

***

And then there is the question today I had no answer for. Cal even prefaced it with, "I've been thinking of this one question...that I just don't know." I thought, Uh-oh. Here it comes. But having been successful with the baby getting out conundrum, I asked him what was on his mind. He asked, genuinely perplexed, "How can ONE person take care of TWO boys?" I told him, smiling to myself, that I honestly do not know. So he asked his dad.

His dad told him that the person had to be a superhero.

I love these guys.