"Are They the Bad Guys?"

Not only has our three year old son been learning about hitting a baseball with a bat (he throws right but bats left, and with tall ancestors, we're thinking first base) but he's learning about the great Giants/Dodgers rivalry. This weekend, as the G-men took three of four from 'Dem Bums, we watched several games on TV.

On Friday I taught him that the Giants, who he knows wears the black hats, were playing a team we wanted to beat. As I pointed out the team in the blue hats, and with no other input from me, he asked, "Are they the bad guys?" What music to the ears to a Giant fan father. I didn't need to explain. He already knows that there is a difference between good and evil. Today, as we watched, I explained again that the Giants were in gray with black hats and the Dodgers were in white with blue hats. He said, "the Dodgers are the bad guys." Then he told mommy his newly learned fact. For about an inning afterward, each camera segue prompted him to say either, "they're the good guys" if a Giant player was shown or "they're the bad guys" if a Dodger. He replied to one panorama of Dodger Stadium with, "Can you go there?" When I said we could go to Dodger Stadium someday, he said, "we better stay close together because of all the bad guys."

I just hope this keeps up.