Loss of innocence

Cavan had his first exposure to the harshness of reality the other day, unfortunately. Completely accidental, but it happened nonetheless.

Shannon was watching a movie entitled "Fast Food Nation," a fictional depiction of the process of our fast-food from animal to check-out counter at McDonald's. It had lots of disturbing scenes that would turn you off fast-food for the immediate future.

Anyway, Cavan was in and out of the room, and at one point, it looked like they were going to slaughter a cow, so Shannon paused it and tried to get Cavan interested in other things. He remained on the couch, though, so Shannon came in to do something else, keeping the movie on pause.

Next thing you know, we both hear the background music resume and some disturbing noises emanating from the living room. I rushed in only to find that the movie had "unpaused," and Cavan was watching a cow (one of his favorite animals) being disemboweled.

I quickly shut the movie off, completely horrified at what had just transpired. He looked up at me and asked, "Why do 'dat?" ("Why did they do that?") I thought my heart would break in two . . . I had no idea what to say and I don't think I said anything. I just picked him up and brought him in the other room.

The funny thing is that he's never unpaused a movie before. In fact, he never really fiddles with the remote at all. So the fact that it just happened to unpause at this point in this movie strikes me as strange and very sad. The thing is, I'm still not convinced that he did it . . .

He didn't mention it again, but I'm sure the damage has been done. I understand that sooner or later, our beloved children will lose their innocence and come to find that the real world isn't as wonderful as they originally thought. It just shouldn't happen at 2 years of age . . .