How did the earth get here?

Where did people come from?

Bam, pow, one after the other. Time slowed as the possible answers flowed through my mind. I lean into it, indicating that I'd take this one. It's been a good day and I've got the psychic energy left for this. I can see The Wife from the corner of my eye wondering what I will say. Taking a second, something that I usually forsake and it shows, I tried to line up my thoughts.

There are few questions whose answers are more telling about what you believe and the strength of those beliefs than these, I'm convinced. I'm not thinking that though. We still talk about Santa Claus and the Easter Bunny here in a house full of little kids, but she's no longer a baby. I should get this right, it's a parental moment-of-truth. Failure to do so will surely be her spiritual gateway to existential angst, lots of door slamming, and numerous changes of career masked as 'soul-searching'. Best to be treading carefully here.

Tackling the harder question first, we discussed at somewhere above a first-grade level the relevant ideas: How a theory is not a truth, was Man created by God or descended from mudskippers, and the fossil record versus a very special week some 6,000 years ago. None of it was very deep; she's not seven yet, but since she's the oldest, we can still be surprised at her understanding.

The first question was the easier of the two. She's still at the age where it's okay to like what Daddy likes and swirling gas and coalescing nebulae are within my realm of knowledge. I checked "astronomer" as a job interest on one of those standardized tests as a teen, and lo, the girls, they did not flock to me. With this girl though, we found a video online that showed the formation of our Solar system after my basement library failed to show us the picture. Try the new "Google Parenting Tool!"

I'm not so vain that I have to congratulate myself here for being honest with my child. The point is that we get dozens of opportunities every week to influence and teach and for once, I know we got a base-hit. The answer wasn't canned, an ideologue's soundbite, but instead the acknowledgment of how vast the universe really is and that beliefs can and do vary. I've made few more succinct speeches in my life, nor felt better about anything I've written (especially here) than those minutes this evening around our table.

She then asked for another serving of baked beans.