Our church teamed up with Westbury United Methodist Church to put on a wonderful concert Sunday night. Traci and I took the three kids and sat about halfway back so the younger two wouldn’t be a distraction to others.
Since the younger sister is taking violin lessons in the Suzuki tradition, she was especially attentive as the strings warmed and tuned to the pipe organ. Soon enough, the first conductor, a friend of mine named Randy Zercher, came out to introduce and direct a Schubert mass.
He came out in his tuxedo and as he expertly explained the importance of the piece we were about to hear, the Younger Sister grabs me by the arm to pull my ear down to her whispering mouth. She asked, “Is that man a president?”
I breathed my answer back in her ear, “Nope, he’s the conductor. All the musicians dress special to let us know how important the music is.”
“Oh.” She whispered. Her brown eyes turned back to him there on the stage and she pondered it a moment or two. Then, no longer whispering she asked, “Are president’s real?” She said it the same way a kid asks you, "Are dragons real? Are monsters real? Is the Easter Bunny real?"
“Yes,” I whispered back. “President’s are real.”
That’s the right answer for a six year old girl who doesn’t yet need to worry about the things I worry about. But the real answer is, “Yes, some of them are real, my child. And some you wish were only a nightmare that ends at daybreak.”
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