The two littlest and I went out to Newport to hear some music at the Ruritan Park on Sinking Creek. I stopped at the the little country store to pick up some super sweet cantaloupes. John and a merry band of little people slid down this giant metal slide for hours, and then someone fetched a sheet of waxed paper from the concession booth and let him slide down on it. He completely fell of from near the top. He was shaken but fine after a while. It did really scare me though. He is getting so big, and he has to try things out for himself.
Speaking of trying things out for himself, John was completely swept up in playing with other boys at camp last week. I asked him about a little girl who will be in his kindergarten next year and he said, "Is that a girl? I don't play with girls."
He was participating in pretend weapons play, perhaps for the first time, and he was eating it up. I want him to get out there and enjoy the pretend play, but I've always had this idea that kids should never pretend to kill. Defend the castle, hunt for dragons, storm the camp, but let's not get down and dirty killing. It has worked pretty well for our family, but next year he is going to be faced with a lot of boys and girls who have been exposed to a whole new level of media violence. I think children need to be shown the kind of behaviors that we want them to model, and that behaviour does not include sexual innuendo or a well stocked arsenal.
Hopefully our little guy will have some fun out there in the great big world. He has a coon skin cap in his backpack, and he's ready to go.
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