This morning started off as a usual Saturday.

I got up with Jonah about 7am, made him a bottle and let him play downstairs in the playroom for a bit. I use the general baby-playing-by-him/herself parenting rule (if you can hear the toys screeching “Row row row your boat” or belting out “Elmo’s Song” a hundred times in a row the kiddo is okay).

Mama woke up, made some coffee, and went to the gym.

Jonny woke up and I made him the easiest breakfast ever — a Costco-sized chocolate muffin .

Jonny wanted to watch “Kung Fu Panda:2” while he was eating his cake muffin for breakfast. I obliged because

1. It’s a Saturday and it’s raining and…
2. It’s a DIFFERENT movie than Big Hero 6 or Frozen  (which he has probably memorized by now…I probably do too) and,
3. I could get some work done while Jonah’s playing and Jonny’s eating/watching his movie.

I work from home and when I don’t have child care, these precious moments when both kids are occupied are rare.

Jonny ate about half the muffin, which is a pretty good portion for a 6-year-old and I let him be excused. He got about halfway through the movie and went upstairs to (I assume) play in his room.

And everything was fine. I was torn between changing Jonah’s diaper (probably poopy from the grunts I heard coming from the playroom) and riding the creative wave for my current work project I had gotten from my second cup of coffee.

Well, Jonah wasn’t crying about his diaper and these moments of work inspiration don’t come often, especially when the kids are home, so I let the kid stew for a minute. * I know I know. shaddup with your judgemental thoughts.*

Anyways, after a few minutes I heard Jonny upstairs. I’m used to hearing him playing so I didn’t pay much attention to it at first, but then I heard him again. He was CRYING.

And he wasn’t crying because he was hurt, he wasn’t wining about not getting a cookie or a new toy and he wasn’t tired or hungry. From a parent of young children’s perspective, there’s really nothing left to be crying about.

So I asked him, “What’s wrong?”

This poor kid is curled up in the fetal position in Jonah’s room next to his crib, clutching a stuffed animal and sucking his thumb between sobs.

“Po’s Mommy and Daddy left him all alone and they died!”

*huh boy*

I was NOT expecting that answer at all. Jonny has seen this movie at least a dozen times if not more and had the thing practically memorized a couple years ago, when last we watched it.

But he finally understood the plot.

I was not in a frame of mind to explain …THIS… to him. It wasn’t even 10am! I hadn’t had nearly enough coffee to even change a diaper.

What do you say to a 6-year-old who has had this momentous realization while watching Saturday morning cartoons?

For those of you who haven’t seen Kung Fu Panda 2, Po (the main character) was adopted by a goose after his parents were (assumed killed) by the bad guy in the movie when Po was a baby. Po’s mother hid Po to protect him and left him to face the bad guy.

The plot of the movie is Po’s journey to find inner-peace in dealing with his past. Basically, Po learns that the past is what helps define you, but it’s the choices you make NOW that are important.

But looking back, it’s hard to figure out what had impacted him. Jonny has watched movies in which important main characters have died, and he has been generally okay. Jonny understands the difference between cartoon characters and real life, so it was a bit confusing why he was crying.

As I  held my little boy as he cried on my shoulder I thought about WHAT he was actually crying about and what his little mind had just comprehended.

1. Jonny has a vivid imagination. He identifies with his toys, and knows every stuffed animal by name, and even knows when one of his 2-dozen stuffed animals is missing. He empathizes with their plight. So his empathy for Po was an extension of that imagination.
2. Po was a baby and his Mama left him even as he cried for her. His Mommy left him all alone. She never came back. This possibility that a Mommy could leave has never entered his consciousness.
3. Po’s Mommy died. She will NEVER come back. We have explained death to Jonny and even experienced it to a degree when Captain died, but Jonny was only 4 when that happened. Mommy’s can DIE. That realization hit home.
4. Po’s Mommy and Daddy had abandoned him. Po was alone and a goose happened to find him and took care of him. If Mommy’s can leave, there’s always Daddy, but if Daddy leaves too, you better hope a kindly goose finds you.

So I just held my little boy as he cried into my shoulder…Cried — mourned for Po…mourned for his Mommy… mourned for his plight as an orphan.

We mourned together.

I didn’t tell him that it was just a cartoon, because he KNEW it was just a cartoon. So I explained to him that yes, sometimes life can be sad. Sometimes bad things happen and people leave…or die and don’t ever come back. Sometimes bad guys win. Sometimes the world isn’t a fun place…at all.

I am grateful to be able to explain it to him myself and that he doesn’t have to learn this lesson the hard way like countless others. Though, I’m sure at some point, he will, as everyone does, and I hope I’ve made that day a little easier.

But today, I just held him and told him that Mommy and I love him and will ALWAYS love him and nothing he could do will ever change that.

When we went back downstairs, the movie was ending, and I told him to come watch the end, which he rarely made it to when he used to watch it. You see Po’s Dad (who is in fact, not dead) in a far-off place and countless other Pandas hearing that Po is alive, and they begin searching for him (presumably a precursor to the next movie).

Jonny took a lot of comfort in that (so thanks for that Dreamworks).

When Mama returned home from the gym, she decided they needed a Jonny/Mommy date and took him out for a cookie and lunch at Applebees about 2 hours ago.

They are still there.