Mice in heaven

Last Thursday was the opening night of the Wisconsin Film Festival. I saw Chalk with some friends, and really enjoyed it. It's a mostly-improvised mockumentary centering around high school teachers. A Q&A with the filmmakers followed - apparently the film has been making the festival rounds for the past year or so, but it's opening in eight cities in May. If it comes to a city near you, it's worth checking out.

I saw three of my nephews for Sunday dinner today. An actual conversation I had with one of the recently-four-year-old twins:

"I climbed on the side of the chair, and Grandma saw me! She won't let me climb behind the TV, either. But if she's in the kitchen, she can't see me!"

(I tell him there are too many wires behind the TV.)

"Yeah, but I could go back there anyway! You know what? There's a mouse trap under our TV at home. I touched it."

(I ask what would happen if it snapped shut on his finger. Note - I don't actually think it's that kind of mouse trap.)

"But I wouldn't get hurt, because I saw Tom and Jerry and a mouse trap snapped shut on Tom's tail and he didn't get hurt!"

(I point out that he is a cartoon and not a kid.)

"Yes, but I still touched it. I would hide behind the TV here, and I might get stuck in the wires, and then Grandma would get mad and she wouldn't pull me out. I would have to stay there forever, and I wouldn't get to eat lunch here ever again. I wouldn't get to eat any pickles, and I wanted a lot of pickles."

(I suggest they might toss him some food behind the TV.)

"But Grandma wouldn't be able to see me! Except for my foot. My foot would be sticking out, and she would see it. And I would find a mouse trap, and it would shut on my hand, and then the mice would run up my finger like this. A mouse would run into my ear! I would have mice in my ears and in my head. And then the mice would be everywhere. Mice eat everything. They would eat all the walls of the house and we would have to sleep outside in a tent. And then they would eat us and we would all die, and Great Grandpa would meet us and take us up to heaven."

(I inquire as to whether there would be mice in heaven.)

"No! I mean, yes, and we would eat the mice in heaven! We would eat them up and that would make us come back to life. And then we would go back to our house. And then the bad dragon from Shrek would throw bombs at our house and blow us up! Shrek the Third is a funny movie, and we're going to see it this summer. We will see it at the movie theater, on a giant screen! We will be big too!"

(He picks up a framed photo he brought from home, of himself and his brothers as babies in front of the Christmas tree.)

"I'm making a story. I'm making a story, and here's how it's going to end. All of us babies were in a movie, on the giant screen like Shrek, and then we fell out of the screen and here we are in the frame, and that's the end! No, and then at the top of this Christmas tree are words that say THE END and they will light up like a star, and that's the end! And then the names come on the screen."

Kids are awesome.