“Do you have a gun?” Asked our First Grader

By vinodnarayan on January 16, 2014 • ( 1 )

“Do you know that the earth is all about friendship?…” Our first grader asked me the other day as I was driving him to school… Last year I used to drop our teenage daughter to her school and was abreast to the spicy teen news… but my wife took that route this year … so now I get more informed on the first graders problems…

Seeing that I was busy driving (as usual) he asked the question again “Papa… Do you know… that the earth is all about friendship…?”
This time I responded “I know”….
but he had more to say… He said
”you know… if you are not for friendship then you could go to other places like Mars or neptune…. or even Jupiter”

I smiled very amused by his statement but then came the real question…
“Papa do you have a gun…?”
“What…?” The question took me by surprise… not something I expected…
“A gun… do you have a gun…?” He repeated
I looked at him in the rear view mirror and his face told that he was serious…. so I replied
“ No…. I don’t have a gun..”
“Are you sure…?” he was not convinced with my reply… or he did not believe me.. he knows my interest for action movies and it was just natural for him to think that a person who watches action movies must be having a gun..

“What about your bedroom?” He did not wait for my answer because he was all set to find out….
“No” I said
“What about the Garage?….. may be in the cupboard….?”
“No I don’t have a gun baba…” I said now both surprised at his persistence and amused at his questions…
“May be in the toilet… you are sure you don’t have one in the bathroom?” He was not in any mood to stop or believe me…

By this time I was curious why he asks so many questions on the subject…. and I stopped the car at the curb and turned back and said…. “No baba… I don’t have a gun… guns are bad… people should not have guns….”

He looked at me and smiled “Good” he said.. and continued
“Because guns are not good for friendship…. and earth is all about friendship and not about guns… you know…” and he repeated
“If you don’t want friendship or if you don’t want earth you can go to mars… or Neptune… or jupiter”
He again paused “or saturn” giving one more option where people having guns can go to…