Over Breakfast

Some people watch the news over breakfast. Some people read the newspaper. Some people read a novel.  

Some people talk.  

Some people talk about planets and moons.  

Some of these people would be my son and me. Like this morning.  

It was just the two of us sitting at the kitchen table, eating. I was asking him about a math program he has been working on the last couple of weeks. Out of the blue, he tells me that the Man in the Moon is just craters and shadows.  

I say, "Yes, and what is the moon made of? Cheese?"  

And he said, "No. Rocks and dirt from the Big Bang."  

Feeling compelled to provide him with complete information, lest he misuse the incomplete version, I responded, "Yes, but more recently than that the Big Bang material was used and expelled by stars and then our solar system and our satellite was made from that material."  

His face contorted. He was quite baffled by this. "You mean rocks and dirt can take pictures?"  

That stopped me in my tracks. Huh? Think, think, think. What did I just say to him?  

Ah ha! I said "satellite". I had to explain the difference between natural satellites and manmade satellites. Then he understood.  

And that is how he started asking me questions about moons. "Is our moon the largest in the solar system?"  

I told him I didn't think so, that maybe Titan is. (Titan is second largest. Ganymede is the largest moon. Ours is the fifth largest.) And we talked about Mars having two moons, Phobos and Deimos. And that Pluto has three satellites. And that Jupiter has lots of satellites and Saturn has both satellites and rings.  

And I said that I wasn't sure about the relative sizes of the moons, since I have a hard time remembering such statistics.  

And he said, "So, you're not a moonologist?"  

No. I'm not a moonologist.  

Where did he come up with that word? Clever boy!