Dino Attack

Last week when we were up visiting my family, Jackson had a sleepover with his younger cousin, Kai. According to my brother the boys did not fall asleep until well after midnight. The following night was Christmas eve and we all stayed over at my brother and sister-in-law's house. Jackson and Kai had been together for two days, up way too late the night before and were very excited about Christmas the next morning. So it should have been no surprise that a few minutes after putting them to bed in the same bunk one of them would be crying. I don't know exactly what happened but from Kai's hysterics and the guilty look on Jackson's face I knew something bad had gone down in that bunk. While my brother took Kai from the room to comfort him I launched into Jackson with questions about what had happened. But the kid wouldn't talk. I could tell I wasn't going to get anywhere with him unless I played the really mean mommy card; I threatened to burn every single present of his under the tree. He fessed up and told me he had done a "dino attack" on Kai. What?! "Why did you do that?!" "I don't know! Don't ask me that. It's too hard to explain!" I stopped the questioning because his last answer made perfect sense to me. When you're a five year old who has been anticipating spending time with your only cousin for weeks and you've played intensely together for the past two days while dealing with physical exhaustion and the excitement of Christmas, the next obvious thing to do with that cousin when put in close quarters together with a complete lack of adult supervision is to go dino on his ass. Am I wrong here in thinking that Jackson's actions were completely justified? Certainly not the way one should behave, but behavior to be expected under the circumstances. Once I understood it from his point of view the night went much more smoothly. Sometimes it helps me to get in touch with my inner 5 year old.