Jesus & the Seal

   My complaint about parenting is the lack of an accompanying manual. When you bring the bundle of joy home, you learn under fire - or under poo. The following years teach a parent the balancing act of keys-phone-purse-groceries-wriggling child. There's the eyes-in-the-back-of-the-head scenarios, designed to make the parent fear peaceful quiet. Linguistic skills are routed through a new portion of the brain which says only, "No," "Yay," "Juice," "Say please," and a careful array of expletives designed to pause adult language in  its tracks.
    (Ex. "Shi..... ver me timbers! What a cute little mess you've made! Don't cry - Mommy can get vomit out of the upholstery.")

   My eldest, a distressingly clever son, approached the Easter season with lots of questions this year. And I was unready to explain the violent nature of the Passion of the Christ to a four and a half year old child. So while we drove to our church's annual Easter egg hunt, I began the conversation with:

   "Tomorrow is Easter!"

   "What's Easter?" asked J.

   "Easter is a time to celebrate new life! We thank God for Jesus and the new life we've been given." I was pretty pleased with myself. It covered the basics, skipped the heresy of an accompanying Easter bunny, and kept the focus clear.

   My son pondered this. And then he nodded sagely. "Jesus."

  "That's right!"

  "Chessuzz!" shrieked the little sister.

   I exchanged proud glances with my husband.

   "Yeah," J continued. "Jesus got eat-ted(eaten). He got eat by the seal!"

   "What?" I was sure I had misheard.
 
   "The seal!" he enthused. "It was bang-whack-grrr - and Jesus beat up the seal!"

   "WHAT?!"

   "Bam! And the seal and the Jesus and they fight!" J began to demonstrate the epic battle with a serious of hand gestures. "And Jesus beat up the seal!"

   "Okay - new subject!" I declared brightly. "Who wants candy?!" (Parenting: the art of distraction.)

    Throughout the day, I took several moments to wonder  exactly what  the Presbyterain preschool was teaching my son. The projects that had come home in his backpack had contained a serious of drawing projects featuring Golgatha, but I hadn't noticed any marine life.

   I called the grandparents to inform them of the situation before J said something about Jesus in public. Instead of dismay, I was awed by my father-in-law's wisdom

   "It's simple," he said. "Jesus and the seal. He means the seal on the tomb."

   Of course. The seal. Stupid homonyms. J had only heard of a seal in the sense of a large, gray animal. It was quite logical. I was greatly relieved.

   But I confess that I refused to correct J. Next year will come plenty soon enough, and there will plenty more conversations I am unprepared for. For now, I am savoring the image of Jesus locked in mortal combat with a seal.