Sunday, October 12, 2008

Way To Burst My Bubble

Hind sight is 20/20. As a parent, I really don't want my boys to make the same mistakes I did. A biggie for me is college--I want them to go there with an actual plan, and not just cross their fingers and hope it works out. I mean, I spent how much money to get a degree in English??

Needless to say, I take Ethan's interests almost as seriously as he does, hoping that one of them will eventually turn into a "career." Right now, Ethan is consumed with dinosaurs. He has a vast collection of plastic dinosaurs that he uses to reinact bloody encounters between meat eaters and plant eaters. He also has a small library of dinosaur books, from which he has memorized vital statistics. Did you know, for example, that a T Rex is 40-ft.-long from nose to tail and has two claws on each hand?

When Ethan and I watched the Denver Museum of Nature and Science's latest Imax movie, "Dinosaurs Alive," I was curious to see if the film would push Ethan's interest in dinosaurs beyond just playing with plastic ones. The movie mixed computer simulations of dinosaurs attacking each other with footage of paleontologists working in the Gobi Desert and New Mexico. All the scientists interviewed in the film got into dinosaurs when they were 6 years old. Plus, according to the movie, paleontology is a burgeoning field--only 2% of dinosaurs that lived have been discovered. That bit of information really got the wheels turning in my head, because it's always good to get on the ground floor of a growing field.

I was happy to see Ethan enraptured throughout the film. When the lights came up in the theater, I asked Ethan if he liked it. "Yes!!" he said. I tried to tamp down the hope in my voice when I asked, "Do you think you'd like to be paleontologist?"

"NO!!" he said.

His emphatic answer made the whirring contraption my head come tumbling down. "Well, why not?" I asked.

"They work too hard," he said. "They have to sit in a car for a long, long time. Then they have to sit in the dirt, in the hot sun, looking for bones."

I have to admit, he's got a point.

11 comments:

Anonymous said...

wow, he really thought about the practicality of that. (oh and I feel your pain with the degree thing, mine jumps up and bites me about once every two weeks.)

kristi said...

I do the same thing. I think TC will probably do something with music, he loves to sing!! LOUDLY!!

sara l said...

lol. I love it when kids come out of left field with funny and logical explanations.

Shannon said...

The boy has great perspective! :)

Interesting you wrote about this - 3 yr old Josh has decided he wants to be a "palenCOlogist" when he grows up. Is the movie too scary for a 3 year old do you think? Thanks for sharing this...

Korie said...

My dream all through childhood was to be a marine biologist. From the time I was 6 until I was about 15 that was all I wanted to do. Then I had my first chemistry class and realized I4d have to learn and do well in chemistry and physics.
sigh

I could be sitting on the sandy shores of Hawaii enjoying a cocktail before swimming with dolphins but because of physics I'm in dreary Belgium with a psych degree that I can't use until I'm fluent in Dutch.

Interesting where our lives lead us.

christophers blog said...

Well at least he was honest! Chris will be a performer even though he won't sing a note with his peers he does know every song and the word to CATS so she should be on Broadway right??

Wayfaring Wanderer said...

Cute story.

MaryAnn Ashley said...

Great story - perfect logic from Ethan indeed.

Honey Mommy said...

Well at least he figured it out early in life, right?

bernthis said...

I so get it. Everyday I listen to my daughter and the minute she says she wants to do something I try to set it up so that she can (that would not include going for ice-cream, by the way, as I would not even promote that as a hobby)

Lisa Nelsen-Woods said...

Take heart, I'm sure he's still destined for greatness. And he may still like palentology when he grows up even if he doen't make it a career. I used to work for a company where the CEO was very into palentology and spent some vacation time every summer going on digs in Arizona. If you won the Employee of the Year award he gave you a fossilized dinosaur egg. Kinda cool.