Gun, With Occasional Music

We've managed to keep M. Small prety ignorant of guns for his short life. We knew he'd become aware of them at some point, but we were hoping to put it off as long as possible. I don't care what your politics are about guns -- if there's a way to discuss them honestly without also getting into violence and death and crime and other concepts we're not ready for him to be ready for, I can't think what it would be. So we put it off and put it off, and not three months ago he heard a word on the radio in the car and asked, "What's a gun?" So we succeeded for a while.

If we'd thought about it for even a moment, we would have realized that Montessori School would have resulted in his being cast out of the Garden of Gun-Free Eden in short order. And now he's obsessed with them, in every form. We still refuse to buy him toy guns, even water guns, but somehow he always manages to find the most vaguely gun-shaped sticks and start pointing them at things. He knows not to makes shooty-noises at people or pets, but he's not above taking an imagniary potshot at a tree now and again. My wife's of the no-tolerance school here when it comes to playing guns, but I can't help wondering if that might fetishize weapons for him even more. As always, it's a tricky balance to strike, and as always, he's not much help in deciding the best way to go.

Ah, well. Probably nothing for it but to buy him his first AK-47 next week when his mom's out of town.

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Gun, With Occasional Music

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