I’d recently bought a CD of children’s songs for the kids. Not exactly children’s songs, but songs from musicals but covered and attuned to children’s tastes.
Its in my car CD player right now and Fighter loves listening to it on the way to and back from school.
So one of the songs on it is Food, Glorious Food from the musical Oliver! (Oliver Twist) if you’re not familiar with it, it’s the story of a little orphan boy who starts out in an orphanage and everyone’s really poor and nobody has much to eat. So at one point, the kids sing this food song wtf.
The song starts in a minor key as the children are lamenting how hungry they are etc, but then the beat picks up and it becomes buoyant as the kids start visualizing and singing about different yummy foods.
This is how my conversation with Fighter went.
Fighter (at the start of the song) : why they sing like this?
Me: it’s just how the song is, Fighter.
is it they sad?
Me: yes they’re sad.
why?
ME because they’re hungry and they don’t have food.
why they don’t have food?
because they don’t have mommies and daddies to buy food for them.
why they don’t have mommy and daddy to buy food for them?
I don’t know… Maybe their mommies and daddies died (thinking how to explain such a deep topic to him so he’ll understand)
The song moves to the chorus so it’s upbeat.
is it they happy now?
yes I guess they are.
why they happy?
I don’t know… Maybe they now have food to eat (making shit up fml)
why now they have food? Is it they have mommies and daddies now?
Wah. Drive my toddler back from school also got so deep revelations wtf.
1. His level of deduction is more advanced than I expected! No mommy and daddy = no food, therefore got food = mommy and daddy must be back.
2. How is he so perceptive?! How the heck does he recognize that a minor key denotes a different tone?! I guess I can save money don’t need to send him to JMC class already
3. This is a way deeper topic than I’d prepared for at age 3! He’s asking why and genuinely wants to know, but how do I explain to him what it means to be hungry and to not have parents to shelter and take care of you?
I tried googling to see what I’m supposed to say if my kid asks these kind of questions and came up with nothing fml hahahaha. I guess this isn’t a very common problem?
But I’m happy he’s curious enough to ask, and that he’s slowly becoming aware that other kids may not live the life he does and that they don’t have the things in his life that he’s always had. That’s the reason we took him to the children’s home for his birthday actually. The two things I’ll try my best to pass to fighter and Penny are empathy and enough courage to do the right thing even if it’s the unpopular thing.
