And soon enough, it will be school dances, with fights outside the girls' bathroom

When I picked Will up from school yesterday, I asked him, like I do every day, how his day went.
"Great!" He exclaimed happily. Then he paused. "Well, except recess."
"What happened at recess, baby?"
"I had to have a serious conversation," he says grimly.
I go into slight mommy panic mode. "Were you in trouble?" I ask nonchalantly.
"No."
"Then what happened?"
(HUGE sigh from backseat.)
"It was Madison and Jala."
Madison and Jala, incidentally, are two girls in his class who seem to fancy Will...sometimes quite possessively so. We've had some trouble before with Madison telling Will she didn't want him playing with other girls, and Jala has been sending home affectionate notes since school started. It would appear we are in the midst of a Kindergarten love triangle.
"What happened?" I ask him.
Another big sigh.
"Well, Madison didn't want me to be friends with Jala anymore, and Jala didn't want me to be friends with Madison. They were trying to make me choose!"
Drama.
"Well, honey, did you tell them you wanted to be both their friends?"
"YES!" he says, exasperated. "But they wouldn't say okay."
"Well, why didn't you just go play somewhere else?"
"Mommy, they were crying about it."
"Crying?"
"Yes. And they wouldn't let me go play until I chose."
Wow.
"So what did you do?"
"I wouldn't choose! And I didn't get to play at ALL at recess. They made me stay there with them and they cried about me not choosing."
Have I said WOW yet?
So we talked about what he could do about it, and I have to tell you, this was one very sincerely frustrated 5 1/2 year old boy. He didn't want either of them to be sad, but he REALLY wanted to just go play at recess. Eventually recess ended, and after his daddy got home last night, it seems they had a man-to-man talk about the situation. Will told me daddy gave him some ideas about how to handle it, and really, I think that's good. Because I'm a girl. And let's be honest -- all girls have had those moments where you keep a boy suspended in mid-air, waiting to find out what his fate will be, knowing that even though you're the one crying, you're also the one in control. But who knew advanced male manipulation was an elective in Kindergarten? Nah...he probably just gravitates toward the drama engenues. After all, the boy does love his mama.