Stopping Traffic

I am loving having a three year old. We are into a serious phase of pretend. It gets to be really fun when he plays more than one role at a time. Sometimes he is the conductor, the ticket taker, and the boy riding the train all in the same scene. Other times he is both the teacher and the student. Most often he is the fire fighter. The other night at Cubbies, though, he was Uncle Steve directing traffic. (Uncle and Aunty are terms of respect here like Sir and Ma'am in the South.) Usually Uncle Steve directs traffic using his flash light in the tight parking lot. But this night Son1 was directing traffic with a Valentine's pencil based on the Cars movie. All the while I heard his little mantra: I-AM-SPEED. I was chatting away with his Cubbies leader, when out of the corner of my eye I saw cars stopping, and heads hanging out car windows. I turned to find my son directing traffic, and folks stopping to chat it up with him. So many folks paid him attention! Someone asked his permission to proceed up the drive. Another person asked him for directions. One more person asked if it was safe to go this way. Lots of people laughed. And then there was me. I laughed differently, with a sense of pride.