There is a huge chasm between what adults think a child understands and what they really do understand of the adult world.

When Timmy was younger he was asked a question in class, and answered ‘bloody shit.’ He was sent to the head teacher but on further investigation was not punished. This was because he had heard his teacher telling an older boy that ‘swearing showed that you could not think of anything better to say.’ Timmy had just been trying to let her know that he could not think of the answer to her question.

He has just been learning about the Diwali festival but his mind is still full of fireworks so he said;
‘We learned about Diwali. It’s a celebration of candles and how good it is that they can’t blow up the houses of parliament like gunpowder.’

Once he said that the chart God kept must be enormous to be able to plot the whereabouts and behaviour of all the people in the world. When I asked what chart he meant, he said ‘Our Father with chart in Heaven!’

Occasionally the confusion turns out to be quite apt, such as his announcement that Poppy Day helps us to commiserate those who died.