This week's column: Things I picked up in kindergarten

I've been spending a lot of time with kindergartners lately. I've found they make excellent company. For one thing, they almost never talk about politics.

First there was my daughter's birthday party last month, where girls who had been together in school approximately 45 minutes earlier emitted high-pitched squeals and jumped up and down upon seeing each other, like they'd just been told that their prize behind Door No. 3 consisted of a lifetime supply of pink plastic barrettes. (This stands in marked contrast to boys, who tend to dispense with greetings and immediately start wrestling over who gets to play with the biggest truck.)

Then the next day, I volunteered in her kindergarten class, which was no country club: I spent most of the day cutting out pink construction paper pig ears, which unfortunately gave me flashbacks to the first grade when Mrs. Brown chewed me out for cutting my pumpkin's construction-paper arms too short. I realize now I should have pointed out that pumpkins aren't technically even supposed to have arms, but being 7 it was basically all I could do to keep from peeing.

Read the rest of this week's At Large by Peter Chianca here.