Wild Man

My Mom had given me this Indian (I don't really have to say "Native American", do I? I mean, after all, I'm a "native American" with German heritage...) costume quite a while ago. She'd saved it from my brothers so that Jonah could wear it. When he first saw it a few months ago, he acted like it was poison and was not about to put that weird thing on.



Well, yesterday he found it, and then proceeded to even put it on, with much joy and exclaiming.

Then, of course, he needed a proper weapon. And a hat. The hat makes the man, you know.

So I made him these things, after which he proceeded to beg for a "bucket on my back to hold my arrows!" and I put my foot down there. No quiver. Nathan laughed and said, "Happy is the man who has his bucket full of them..." Today, I did allow a target with a bullseye and a drawing of a buffalo to shoot at.




So now I don't think we'll ever be able to get him to take it off. It's part of him, and everything he talks about.

He wants to shoot buffalo.

"Indians don't sleep in beds!" we heard at bedtime.

"Indians don't have names!" he said when I called him for supper.

"Is there buffalo on my sandwich?" he asked at lunchtime.

It took a while for him to get the co-ordination of his little bow and arrow, but once he did, he spent the day stalking me with a loaded bow (takes a while to load, too) and shooting me when I walked by.

And you know what? The kid has remarkably good aim.

It's uncanny, really...

And yes, he is wearing the shirt backwards today...