The Source

This morning I witnessed one of the sources of evil of my 'little nemesis' up the street. His uncle who is about 19 now brings him to the bus every morning. This morning the kids played the game 'punch buggy no turn back'. It is where they see a VW Bug and tell their friends to guess what color, old or new and if it is a convertible or not. Sweet, innocent, slightly annoying game (no physical contact though). The uncle looked confused...what is that about? He said the real game is SLUG BUG. I said, hey you've gotten older, the game has changed. He said (to the children ages 7-11) the REAL game is that you punch your friend when you see a Bug. He proceeded to then say, if you don't like the person you punch them in the stomach and if you REALLY don't like the person you punch them in the face. I said. HEY there are 7 year olds here and I'd like to preserve some of their innocence...to which he whispered to the kids...you can do it when you're older. AAAAAARRRRRGH.

This is just ONE slice of the complexity of the 'end of innocence' for my neighbor kid who is 7 and then for my kid by default. I do know that this uncle kid had some learning issues in school...As much as I want to be compassionate about that issue, I also don't want my kid to have to be exposed to this. I am on a no play date policy with my son at the moment and so far I haven't had to tell any of the 'interested parties' because it hasn't come up. If it does, I'm gaining more and more confidence (and evidence) to say NO WAY! grumble.