One of the ongoing challenges of my life is getting my kids to talk about their day. I ask all sorts of questions, try all sorts of different approaches. My most successful approach is to ask if they did anything fun at the playground during recess. They’re always excited to talk about the playground.

The other day, however, this question led to a place I had never anticipated…

“So, what did you do today?” I asked during dinner. “Anything fun? How about the playground?”

“We played Chase the Girls,” my youngest said. “Chase the Girls, Daddy.  Chase the Girls!” He gestured dramatically with his hands.

“Oh yeah?” I smiled. “I think I might have played that once or twice myself.”

My wife rolled her eyes at me. She does that a lot.

The little guy didn’t notice. He was too excited about the game. “Yeah, we ran and ran and ran!”

“Did you catch them?”

“Yeah!”

“Hey, that’s great. What did you do then?”

“We put them in jail!”

For some reason, I hadn’t seen that answer coming. “Jail?” I asked.

“Yep, we got them all in jail, then we lit a match and we set them on fire!” He slipped out of his chair to gesture dramatically with his hands again. “Fire!”

“Um, fire?”

“Yeah! Then they turned into food and we ate them.” He climbed back into his chair.

“Um, okay.”

“It was just pretend, Daddy.”

“Yeah, I guessed that. What did the girls do?”

He smiled. “They played chase the boys! We ran and ran and ran!”

“What did they do when they caught you?”

“Nothing,” he shrugged. “They didn’t think of putting us in jail.”

“Oh,” I said, turning back to my meal. I feel like I should have said something more, but I really couldn’t think of anything. I mean I don’t have a speech ready for the “don’t set girls on fire and eat them” message. Do you?