Captain Rex and Secret Service Agent

Yesterday Ethan woke up with laryngitis, but otherwise seemed fine (it’s probably the remnants of a bad cold he’s had for the last week). I took him to school, but as I was dropping him off, he looked miserable, and asked to come home. Five minutes after getting home, he came out of his room with new pants on, and announced he was ready to go back to school. Apparently he was very upset that the jeans he was wearing were too short. This process took approximately one hour.

Ethan was Captain Rex from Star Wars on Halloween this past weekend. That morning, he threw a complete fit, and begged to go back to the store, because the gun he had with the costume was not the right gun. It was a Star Wars style gun, but not Captain Rex’s gun. (He knew this when he bought the costume, but later had regrets). Mark said that he should say that Captain Rex captured the gun from someone else on the battlefield. Ethan bitterly countered that “No one takes anyone else’s guns in Star Wars.” This was one of those moments in parenting when I just couldn’t sympathize with his point of view, feeling like it was a concession on my part to let him take any gun in the first place. And, of course, no one, no one at all, noticed that it was the wrong gun.

The other day I asked Ethan what he wants to be when he grows up, and he said he wants to be a Secret Service Agent. I asked him why, and he couldn’t really say, except that it was cool. I’m thinking that maybe it’s because they get to wear sunglasses, are important, and perhaps most important, they can carry a gun – the right gun.