I sometimes share clean adult jokes that are too clever for a 2 year old to grasp. Sometimes it is fun to see the confused look on his face when he sees me cracking up on my own jokes. Yes, I laugh at my own jokes, moving on.
We're hanging out at a coffee shop and I start with the setup for a great joke.
Me: Vian, did you know that humans eat more bananas than monkeys?
Vian: What? They eat monkeys?
Me: LOL!! Way to ruin the punchline man.
We are at the dining table. I take out the croissant from the bag and place it on a plate in front of Vian.
Vian: Appa, what kind of "cossant" is it?
Me: It's a plain croissant, Vian.
Vian: No. It's a bum-bum "cossant".
Me: Huh?
Vian: Look it (pointing to his misshapen croissant that looks like a butt).
You win this round, Vian.
Sempi and I read bedtime books together and discuss the story before he goes to sleep.
The story we read had a mention of illegal drugs. Apparently he didn't know what drugs were. So we discussed what drugs were and how some bad guys can sell drugs to victims and why it is illegal.
Suddenly Sempi drops this nugget of wisdom.
People are always born to be strong and good. No one is born to be weak or evil.
Friends who know me well, know that I strongly believe "people are generally good". I guess that belief is a genetic trait.
Sempi (my 6yo son) and I have this tradition of sharing our problems and asking each other's opinion on how to solve it. We do this while we walk to his school. We've been doing this since he was 3. Here's an example from Portland.
Me: When I bike to work, I have to wait a long time for the elevator.
Sempi (3yo): You should just build a ramp to your 28th floor, so you can just bike all the way up.
Me: Alrighty then.
Back to present day, I was discussing a problem with him about my work.
Me: I have this big presentation coming up and I'm nervous.
Sempi: Why?
Me: There's going to be VPs and an Executive attending this presentation. So I'm anxious about it.
(Sempi thinks for a while)
Sempi: There is a fire pole at the playground and I get nervous about going down that pole. What helps me is, I don't think about it, I just do it. So you should do the same. Don't think about it, just do it.
Me: Whoa! You know that's actually pretty good advice.
I'm happy to report that I took his advice and I kicked butt.
Some nights I read a book about Gandhi to Sempi for bedtime. There is an incident in Gandhi's life when he's thrown out of a first-class coach in South Africa because he is not white. I told Sempi that it was an injustice and it doesn't happen anymore. He listened intently and nodded approvingly. The next night I'm reading a comic about superheros and he asks me, "How come everyone in Justice League is white?".
I stuttered to come up with an answer at that moment, cursing myself for introducing him to the concept of race.
Since then he's asked me to read the Gandhi book many times and we talk about the struggles, non-violence and civil disobedience.
Recently, his elementary school teacher did a fantastic job of introducing the struggles of Martin Luther King Jr. He was excited to learn about MLK and how he learned some of the techniques from Gandhi and Thoreau. So naturally, we bought a new bedtime book about MLK.
One night we had this exchange.
Sempi: Appa, how did the first person came into existence.
Me: (I was gearing up to talk about evolution, Adam and Genesis).
Sempi: Appa, if there was a single person in the beginning, then we all came from that person.
Me: (excitedly) That's true. Everyone in the world is related. You're probably related to Ms. Cochran (his elementary shcool teacher).
Sempi: (giggles) Hehe. It also means that Martin Luther King could be my relative. Hehe.
Me: Absolutely!! You know MLK and Gandhi were probably your great great grandfathers.
That's my son. :D