A 5 Year Old’s Rite of Passage.

Henry sometimes gets upset about always having to do what I say. In these moments his go-to is always; “when do I get to be the boss??!”

When I ask him what he would do if he was boss he always says he would buy gum. Probably because he’s never had it. I’ve always said he needed to be a bit older as to not be tempted to swallow it.

So. 2 days ago I let him buy gum.

He chose the 5 Gum Watermelon brand at the local Super A grocery store. He held it so proudly in his hands all the way home. Smelling the package and saying; “it smells soooooo good”. I could practically see the hearts in his eyes.

I told him he could open it if he wanted to and have a stick on the way home, but he said he wanted to wait. I think he wanted to stretch out the excitement. Which is more discipline than I would have had if this moment had been mine.

After we got home he ran into the house and I watched him as he opened a stick, folded it over onto itself a couple of times and put it in his mouth. He was clearly in heaven.

He chewed that first piece for about 5 minutes, spit it out and opened up the next one. 5 minutes later, he spit that one out. And then the next. Each time folding the stick carefully over so it was a big fat juicy stack to pop into his mouth.

I think he polished off the entire package in 5 minute intervals like this. And each time he went to spit it out into the open mouth of the garbage can, he was skipping all the way there and all the way back. Skipping with joy and absolute glee. He was happy. This was a big deal. He obtained an experience that up until this point had not only been unknown, but in his mind - forbidden.

It was a milestone. And he knew it.

And the best part; he was instantly older and cooler. He didn’t just feel older and cooler to himself. He LOOKED it from the outside. He was chewing that gum and whipping up cool dude dance moves and stances that I’ve never seen him do before in my life. Imagine if the movie “Grease” and Bruno Mars had a baby...

I could see that he felt his life had finally begun. And maybe it did.

And as I sit here with a full, warm, happy heart just thinkin’ about the whole experience, at the same time I can’t ignore the titch of trepidation creeping in wondering what could possibly be next…