Love on a School Bus

When Ethan hopped off the bus the other afternoon, he was grinning a wide toothy grin.  Since the start of kindergarten has been a bit rocky, to say the least, I was pleasantly surprised to see a happy kid emerge from the school  bus.

"Today was great mom!" E explained.

Giving him a big, bear-hug, I replied, "Oh Ethan!  I am sooo glad you had a good day."  I extracted myself from his cling, looked him in the eye, and then said,  "What made it so good?"

But before he could answer,  a little girl's blond head popped up in the school bus window and waved frantically.  The impossibly cute little girl shouted out the window, "BYE ETHAN!!!"

Ethan blushed, and I had a bit of a clue as to why Ethan's day was so great.

"Ethan, who was that?"  I asked, playing dumb.

Trying to be cool, Ethan replied, "Oh Mom, that is just Tate.  She's my girlfriend."

I surpressed my giggle and remarked, "Oh really? How did you get to be boyfriend and girlfriend?"

Ethan explained it simply. "Well, she sat down on the bus next to me, and then she said, 'You are my boyfriend, and I am your girlfriend!'  so I figured, OK."

"You figured, OK?" I repeated.

"Yep!"  he answered.  "I thought that she IS a girl and she IS my friend so .  . .it's OK for her to be my girl-friend."

I laughed at his explanation and assured him that it was, indeed,  OK for her to be his girl-friend. As we walked away, I thought about how Tate had made E's day by just showing she cared about him (even if she was a little direct).  I wanted to  reach out and kiss that little girl named Tate who had made my little boy smile.  That is, I was thinking about kissing her until Ethan broke into my train of thought.

"Mom . . .isn't Tate sooooo stinking  cute?"  he remarked.

And I realized two things.  One,  apparently I was not the only one that was thinking about kissing Tate, and two,  I am in sooooooo much trouble.