Jachin came home from school yesterday, dropped his backpack on the floor of the kitchen, and said, “Mom, do you know what December 7th is?”

“Umm, I don’t know… a Monday?” I ventured a wild guess. (I was even wrong about that, though. The 7th is actually a Sunday.)

“No, it’s Pearl Harbor Day,” he said, sounding a little exasperated over his mom’s ignorance.

“Oh yeah, I knew that,” I said.

“What’s Pearl Harbor?” Zoe asked, dropping her backpack next to her brother’s.

“It’s this place in Hawaii that was bombed and lots of people died,” Jachin said.

“Today?” Zoe asked, looking worried.

“No,” Jachin said, sounding exasperated again, this time over his younger sister’s ignorance. “In World War II. That was a long time ago, when Japanese people didn’t like us.”

“Why didn’t they like us?” she asked.

“Who knows?” Jachin said, throwing up his hands. “But guess what the good thing is?”

“What?” Zoe and I both asked.

“It’s good that World War II is over, because if it was still going on, we wouldn’t have Super Mario Brothers, or Nintendo, or Pokemon! But luckily since that war is over, the Japanese started letting us trade and buy stuff from them again.”

“Wow,” said Zoe, amazed at her brother’s seemingly endless knowledge.

“Can you imagine how our lives would be without Nintendo or Pokemon?” Jachin asked. And he and his sister looked at each other with hilarious looks on their faces, appalled at the thought. And I briefly imagined all of the extra hours that would be spent outside without Nintendo or Pokemon. But still, we are all very happy that World War II is over.

And I made a mental note to give some kudos to Jachin’s teacher for presenting ideas to my kid in a way that hits home and makes sense.

And then, for some unknown reason, I got a hankering for sushi…