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An Aye for an Aye

Kenzo went back to school today after his sick day. He was pretty excited, but also late as ever getting outside this morning to meet the neighborhood boys and girls for the walk to school.

When he got home he raced up to my office and told me he caught himself a beetle. It's a beaut.

You can tell from this photo that Kenzo is still recovering from two days of high fever.


But man oh man he couldn't have been more proud and excited to have caught his own kuwagata beetle. He said he caught it while walking home from school. It was flying and luckily he had his bug box so he opened the lid and grabbed it in mid air. 

I might need to confirm this story with his friends.

Also, Kenzo is still not taking his assigned route home.

I haven't broached the topic yet, and I may not, but I feel the need to talk with Kenzo about the unfortunate incident last week when that jerk classmate stomped on his beetle. We talked about it a little when he calmed down after it happened, and he bounced back pretty fast. It's one of those things he'll likely remember his whole life, and I want to be sure to use it as a building block for his resilience.

The fact that he caught another even cooler beetle today seems to me a great way to help him understand that bad things are gonna happen in life. Jerks are gonna stomp on our beetles sometimes. We have the power to either let that hinder us from being our best selves, or we can head out into the world each day undeterred and continue to catch even cooler beetles and let the jerks be jerks.

The best way to get back at those who would get in the way of our happiness is to brush ourselves off and move forward without letting them get to us. If we let those people affect who we are and how we react to the world then they really do get the best of us, and they win their stupid game.

Having said that, I'm thinking about having a talk with Kenzo about bullies. If someone tries to mess with you, protect yourself. Kick'em in the crotch and go find an adult. 

An eye for an eye might make the whole world blind, but an eye for an eye also makes the whole world auditioning for 'Pirates of the Caribbean'.

I tend to use humor as a defence. Eri questions my definition of humor.

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