This past Easter weekend, Miss J and I went to an event that is held each year in the Bay Area called Eggster. We enjoyed checking out all the booths that were set up on the UC Berkeley campus, which provided artistic activities and cool science projects and information. Cal's Student Parent Association for Recruitment & Retention, also known as SPARR, even coreographed a moonwalk station for the kids that encouraged them to collect as many moon rocks as they could (which were really silver painted plastic eggs filled with treats). I trailed Miss J, arms overflowing with art project after art project, and mini basket of plastic egg after plastic egg, as she gathered with friends and had her knowledge tested on dental hygiene at a booth that was giving free floride treatments to the children and another booth that had human organs on display.

Miss J was fascinated with the two lungs and the two very different livers that lie in a tray in a shallow bath. She put on two latex gloves and identified which of the livers was healthy and which of the lungs was unhealthy. Falling even more deeply fascinated with her discovery of the connection between the unhealthiness of the lung and smoking. I've had these talks with her before about smoking and its affects, as she has tried to understand why, if smoking is so bad, that her aunt does it. Well, she got a chance to school asked her.

As if I had not already eatten enough ham, greens, yams, potato salad, corn bread muffins and banana pudding at my own house during Easter dinner, I whipped up a couple of plates and headed over to my sister in-law's house to collect some of her bbq ribs... which I had every intention on saving for the next day, but instead ended up savoring later that night. Anyhoo... as we were gearing up to leave, my sister in-law and a cousin decided to light up their cigarettes. Miss J advanced toward them talking and I began to over talking her, saying, "uh uh, come back this way. Talk to your Lee Lee from over here." As Miss J continued, my sister in-law couldn't make out what she was saying above the music and laughter that was going on in the house. So, I asked Miss J to tell me what she was trying to tell her aunt.

Miss J: Um... you remember the black stuff?

Me: Black stuff? What black stuff?

Miss J: From smoking?

Me: Oh! Yes (I say with a smile)

She turned and proceeded to tell her aunt about how, if she continued to smoke a lot, then her lungs were gonna be all black and brown and mushy and nasty, because smoking isn't healthy. And when you smoke your lungs become unhealthy. My sister in-law thought this information was hilarious coming from a soon-to-be 6 year old, and told her that what she had said was very true... then continued to puff on her cigarette.