Bedtime stories

Yeah I know it's been nine days but who cares?

So I was reading bedtime stories to my two little boys. The first was the Tin Forest. A quaint little tail where an old man who lives in a junkyard never stops dreaming. He eventually builds a forest out of metal debris, a beautiful lifeless forest. But all of a sudden birds start showing up and trees start growing and komodo dragons appear. (I made the komodo dragons part up) And the tin forest suddenly becomes a real forest, all because an old man never dared to stop dreaming. This story is a true tour-deforce in the mold of Field of Dreams. "If you build it, they will come."

After Tin Forest it was on to a more serious drama. Rosa, the childrens book by Nikki Giovanni, that discusses the life of Rosa Parks. It's a pretty intense read for little ones. Luckily my littler one, fell out after Tin Forest. The drama was to exciting. It just wore him out. But My big/little one was wide awake. And he asks "What does 'Emmit Till was vicously lynched' mean"? Any thoughts out there people? How do you explain one of the greatest individual tragedies of the last century, to a six year old. I have no idea. So I told him the truth, sort of. I actually didn't get into lynching yet. I just told him that Emmit Till was killed. I didn't explain the horrific details. Just the basic ones. I think that was enough to upset him. And honestly I don't really want him to have to think about things like this, not yet. But he is six and he's growing up. Not in the "dad can I have the car keys so I can go have sex and do drugs?" sort of way. More like his mind is expanding and I need to be prepared for things like this.

I'm not.
I try.
It's hard.
I'll do my best...