Sunday School Might Help

Fiona's taken to announcing that she's really 6 1/2 years old. Which would make her awfully old for preschool, but I think she's mainly telling us that as a way of convincing us that she's old enough to do something. Climb up the china cabinet. Drink a soda. See an R-rated movie.

I asked her if she knew what year it was and she responded "2008" (she knows the year, although she pronounces "thousand" as "towzand"). Then I asked her if she knew what year she was born, figuring I'd show her that she was zero in 2004, one in 2005, etc.

Fiona replied "January!"

"No," I said, "January's the month. Do you know what year you were born?"

"Seven!"

"No, that's the day. The year you were born was 2004."

As I was about to launch into my teachable moment that would have gone completely over her head anyway, Fiona asked:

"What's two thousand?"

"That's the number of years," I replied.

"There've been two thousand years?"

Well, even the intelligent design crowd gives the planet a few thousand more than that, and I told her "it's how many years since Jesus was born."

And now I was in for it.

"Who's Jesus?" she asked.

She'd been to Sunday school in San Diego a few days earlier, and she can recognize Jesus in a nativity set. "Did they talk about Jesus at all in Sunday school?" I asked. Fiona shook her head. "Well, Jesus was the son of God."

"Is he dead?

Ah, now this was getting tricky, although at least theologically speaking I was going to be talking about my own religion. "Well, he died on a cross but then he came back to life. That's what Easter is."

"He died but then he came back to life?" Fiona asked, incredulous. I nodded. Fiona thought about it for a moment.

"That's silly."

Now, how is it I went from trying to count up from the year 2004 to listening to my daughter blaspheme in the space of two minutes? Another parenting triumph, I suppose.