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Dialogue with my four-year-old son

By zion613 | Posted: 07 May 2009

Views: 379
This is a true conversation I had with my son several days ago. I'd like to expand it to short story length, but here's the first draft I'll work from.

'Ima' is Hebrew for 'Mother;' 'Saba' and 'Zeidy' are Hebrew and Yiddish for 'Grandfather.'

Please let me know what you think.
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
"Ima, what happens when people die?" he asks me, his little brow creasing with 
worry he shouldn't have to face for decades.

"Well," I tell him, thinking fast, "our bodies stop working."

"Oh." He frowns. "But I don't want my body to stop working."

"It's a little scary to think about, isn't it?" I ask.

He nods.

I continue, trying to comfort him: "But we don't just disappear when our bodies stop working. Our souls go back to God."

"What's a soul?" he asks.

I sigh. He's a bright kid, and he asks a lot of questions. Sometimes. But I answer him anyway. "A soul is a little piece of God that He gives us when we are born into this world."

He doesn't ask where babies come from. We've had that discussion already.

"Our soul," I continue, "is given to us by God to help us make choices in life. If we choose to do good things, God is happy. But if we choose to do wrong things, God is disappointed."

This puts me in mind of the time he asked, "Why did God make bad guys?" I smile at the memory.

I continue: "When our souls go back to God after we die, He accepts them in degrees: the more good deeds one does in one's life, the more one's soul can enjoy God's glory after death. The more wrong things one does in one's life, the less one's soul can enjoy God's glory."

This, I see, is way over his head.

"Ima, am I going to die?" he asks.

I fear he's going to cry, so I put my arms around him and hug him tightly.

"Sweetie," I say, "hopefully, you're not going to die for a really, really long time."

"But I don't want to die ever!" he protests.

"It happens to everyone," I say. "Saba died. My Zeidy, whom you never knew, died a long time ago. But they were very old when it happened. You're only four. So you don't have to worry about it yet."

But he does.

And I...how can I explain to him that death is not a thing to be feared?

How can I explain this to him...when I'm still trying to convince myself?
All articles on this website by zion613 are copyright ©zion613 and should not be reproduced without the author's prior written consent. All opinions are the opinions of their respective authors and are not necessarily the opinions of The Writers' Circle.
Comments 
JD Higginson
07 May 2009
A touching look at death from a child's perspective. If you do expand it then try and keep the same endeering feel that the current version has. Just have a look at the last two lines as I'm struggling to make sense of the mid-sentence full stops.

Great job though.

Keep it up.

JD
zion613
07 May 2009
Thanks, JD. In the last two lines, I meant to put "..." but when you copy and paste from Word, this site translates that as "." . I corrected it.

;)
JD Higginson
07 May 2009
Ah, I get it now. I've had that problem before too.

Love your work.

JD
Jennifer Munro
07 May 2009
This was lovely and sensitive and true. Great writing !
ChrissieJo
07 May 2009
Charming and sensitive too.
poppy101
07 May 2009
Sometimes by explaining a really complex subject to a child we understand it better ourselves - adults make things far too complicated than they need to be.  Your son is very lucky to have an intelligent caring mother like yourself - children are born curious, they learn by touch, experimentation and when they possess language then by questioning - if I could give one piece of advice to any parent it would be to never stop answering those questions no matter how hard they are - I work in a school with a fairly high degree of poor backgrounds both socially and economically and it breaks my heart when the children have lost at the early age of 5 the ability to enquire about the world around them, usually the reason is because if no one answers your questions then guess what - you stop asking.
zion613
07 May 2009
Thank you so much for your comments, everyone.

Happy writing. ;)
Shadowwritr
08 May 2009
I have critiqued your work as follows -

[First impressions]
I found your work interesting and believable
I found your work to have an easy, rolling rhythm that moved the story forward
I remember that conversation with my own son.  Mine had some of the same elements that yours had.
[Beginning]
I found the beginning compelling
Kids have some of the best facial expressions.  Their faces are so open at times you can almost tell exactly what they are thinking.  The opening of that piece showed it.
[Plot]
I thought your plot was good, exciting and distinguishable and had a central theme
On expanding it, I would suggest putting a little more of the expressions in.  You know your child better than anyone, just watch him and see what he does, even when they talk about the silliest of things.  That's the only thing I see missing, I know he's doing it, but you can't see it further on in the piece, but you get your reactions from his expressions.
[Characters]
Your characters jumped off the page at me and attracted my attention
I felt your characters were real people with real lives, faults and merits
[Dialogue]
Your dialogue moved the scene forward
taylorswift97
09 January 2010
This was a really interesting piece if writing. 
Very good.
audreyhepburn
23 January 2010
Good...your son is obviously very serious some of the time!

You should expand this.  It's a good idea.

Audrey

Writer
zion613

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Roles: Writer
Baltimore, MD, UNITED STATES
I'm a young stay-at-home mother. Thank God, I have a wonderful husband (who is very supportive of my writing) and three wonderful children (not so much). I like to read and write historical fiction, especially ... (Read more)
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