Family...what?

On the way to school today, my son and I started talking about family. The conversation started with him asking why I didn’t have a brother….

“Well, my mom and dad just had two kids, me and my sister.”

“You have a sister?” He asked, surprisingly. As if he had no idea that his aunt, whom we see all the time, was my sister. (We don’t look very much a like, but still!)

“Yes, Patsy is my sister.” I told him.

“But she’s older than you!”

Ok, so he gets that much. Maybe there’s hope.

“Yes, she is. You are older than your sister. You are her big brother.”

“Whoa,” he said. So if you had another baby, and it was a girl, I’d have two sisters? And if you had another baby and it was a boy, I’d have a big brother?”

Sigh. “No, you’d have a little sister or a little brother. You’d still be the big brother. But you won’t, because mommy can’t have any more babies.”

“What about daddy?" he asked.

"What ABOUT daddy? Can he have babies?" I was lost.

"No, does daddy have a sister?"

“Yes, he does. But she lives far away and we never see her. But that’s ok, because we see daddy’s brothers a lot.”

“We do? Who?” Ugh. How long can this conversation last?

“Uncle Rob and Uncle Billy. They are your uncles, but they are daddy’s brothers. And they are Papa and Grandma's sons.”

With a really blank look on his face, he said, “Wow, this family is complicated.”

That is the understatement of the year...if he only knew.