I’m not sure if this is a “what, just me?” thing, but this video seems to indicate that it’s possible that it’s not just me.

You see, I’m talking about that moment in parenting when your kid asks you about something when you’re dead…

For me, the first time was being asked by my son if he could have my comic book collection when I died. This was, hmmmm, five years ago. When I was THIRTY-FOUR YEARS OLD!!! I may have let a four-letter word slip and said “Holy shit, man. What the hell?! I’m… I’m barely middle-aged! I’m not going to die for a long time.” And that moment was, of course, followed by that moment when your kid says, “But! When it happens…???” Like some kind of morbid, freak show of calling dibs on something.

(Watch past the credits at 2:20 or you’ll regret it.)

I can’t complain. I don’t recall it well, but I know I asked my dad something like this, too. The reason it didn’t bother me too much when one of my own kids asked me something along this very dark and fatal line was that I did remember asking my dad something like this myself as a knee-biter (I think it was about inheriting his tools).

When you’re a kid, there’s a weird sense of disassociation with death. There’s soooooo much life ahead of a them as to seem like a secondhand sort of immortality. No meaningful fear of it. Yet. So asking someone older about something in relation to when they’re dead doesn’t have the weight it does as the person hearing it.

Has your kid ever asked you about something after you’re dead?

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