But He's A Daddy!

So the other day I am picking up my kids from school and driving home. On the way there is a railroad crossing and often times the gates are down and the trains are going in and out of the city. Peyton especially enjoys this as one of her early words was choo choo! Anyway, this day we get stopped by the train and we are waiting for it to pass. I notice it's getting closer and then i notice this guy on the other side of the tracks starting to run across them to beat the train. This could be bad I thought. The train is close and this guy could get run over right before my kids' eyes. So I turned it into a lesson.

"Austen," I said, "Never, ever, run across the tracks when those gates are down." Of course I was thinking how many times as a kid I would hear the gates go down and my friends and I would run to the tracks as fast as we could to put a penny on them so the train would flatten it.

It seemed like Austen was listening to me so I followed up with, "If the train hits that guy, he'll never see his mommy or daddy again!" To which Austen replied, "Mommy, but he is a daddy!" Meaning he is old enough to be the daddy. So I changed tactics. Okay, that guy is never going to see his little boy again if he gets hit. Silence in the backseat. I think he got it. I only hope he doesn't learn how trains can flatten pennies when he's older.