Nurturing your children's dreams

By Staff
Melissa Cason, Franklin County Times
Last week, my six-year-old son, Jordan, dropped a bomb on me by telling me his career ambitions when he grows up.
He walked right up to me and told me that he wants to be a policeman when he grows up so that he can take mean people to jail.
I was shocked. I always thought my boys would want to be a doctor, lawyer, dentist or a teacher.
It never entered my mind that one of my boys would want to become a policeman.
It's not that I think it's a bad choice for him; it's just that he's my son, and I don't want him put in dangerous situations.
When he told me about his ambition, I just simply smiled and told him that regardless of what dream he decides to chase his dad and I would always support his decision. Secretly, I hope that he changes his mind.
Jordan's class apparently toured the Haleyville City Jail during a field trip to city hall just before school got out.
The police officer told Jordan's class that the people were in jail because they were mean, which is a simple explanation for kindergarteners.
Ever since school has been out, both my boys have been playing cops and arresting each other to take them to the pretend jail in their bedroom.
Some people say that six-year-olds don't know what they want to do, but I say that some children just know what they want to do. Take me for example. I am a reporter, and I love what I do. When I was a little girl, I used to pretend I was Oprah and my dolls were the panel. Granted, I don't have a talk show now, but what I do is not all that different. Oprah started out as a reporter, and if you get to the core of what she does on the show, she is still a reporter, but in a different way-in a talk show format. My format is the newspaper.
Regardless of what my boys decide to do with their lives, I want to support and feed their dreams so that they can grow up to be responsible, productive adults. That's all a parent can really hope for.