Walking down their road one day, Marc Parent's son Casey spied a dead squirrel. This prompted a discussion about life and death, God and Heaven, after which Casey asked, "Can we kick it?"

There is nobody like a child to look life's greatest mysteries square in the eye, and there is no writer like Marc Parent to translate children's revelations to the rest of us. He tries to teach his sons how to win at his favorite board games, but learns instead the real joy of making up your own incoherent rules. He nurtures their compassion; they teach him about love and forgiveness in the face of anger. This is a book about the things we knew as children -- about gratitude and playfulness, acceptance and love -- that elude us as adults.