A Table for 4

When I picked Little Boy G up from daycare the other day, the first thing he said to me in the car was, “Ashes and Kisses.”

I said, “Okay.”

He said again, “Ashes and kisses.”

Again, I said, “Okay. What is that? A book you read today or something?’

“No,” he said. “Ashes and Kisses.”

Ugh, I thought. This shouldn’t be this difficult. I said, “I know what kisses are, but what are the ashes? What do they have to do with kisses?”

He groaned. “ASHES AND KISSES.” (“you stupid woman,” implied).

“G! What is it? Is it a song? Or a book?”

“A SONG,” he said. “By that lady. Ashes and Kisses.”

And then it hit me. “Are you saying, “Passionate kisses?”

“Yeah!” he said. “Passionate kisses.”

We had heard the Mary Chapin Carpenter song 9 hours earlier on the way to school. I sang along with it, because it’s one of my favorite songs ever. And he remembered it and the melody all day even though he had never heard the song before that morning. I find that astonishing.

And then he said, “What’s passionate mean?” (Ashes making far more sense to him).

I said, “You know how when you grab my face, tell me you love me,  and then kiss me really hard on the mouth? That’s passionate kisses.”

“Ah,” he said and nodded.

So all that night he and I walked around the house singing, “Shouldn’t I have this? Shouldn’t I have this? Shouldn’t I have all of this and Ashes and Kisses…..”