Things Ten-Year-Olds Say

I recently took Peck and a friend to a local attraction. As they talked in the backseat, snippets of their conversation floated up to me in the front.

If I don’t get archery, I’ll be triggered.

I’m really good at division, but I keep forgetting multiplication

I’m sweaty at Fortnite. (That word could mean “really good” or “played a long time.” Those definitions are the best I could discern from context.)

What’s your favorite Pokemon?

What’s the grossest thing you can imagine involving a cat? If you were sleeping and your cat was on your chest and your mouth was open and your cat coughed a hairball into your mouth and you swallowed it.

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With all the drama, controversy and rage in social media, hearing these innocent (albeit gross) things refreshed me and got me thinking.

1. As parents, we need to be careful about letting all that discord spread to our children. In our attempts to educate them about the world’s struggles, we press adult problems on them. Children should be thinking about Pokemon and not be consumed with ideas that are beyond their control. Awareness is important, but we need to temper it with age-appropriate input.
2. Sometimes, I spend too much time in the digital world and let it color the real world. Like Peck and his friend, real people discuss all kinds of things. I hang out with friends I disagree with politically and politics never come up! We talk about our shared love of science fiction or action movies or our pets. Yet, when I spend too much time on social media, those same people seem a world apart, and I wonder, “How did we ever get along?”

As grown-ups, I think we would all benefit with a break from the claustrophobic world of the internet. Let’s go out IRL (in real life) and talk like ten-year-olds … minus the hairballs.