That fine line

"There is, in fact, a fine line between having fun and being disciplined," I thought, sitting in the rather uncomfortable black metal chairs tucked against the periwinkle blue walls of the Karate studio.
We arrived at the conclusion that Karate would be a good sport for our five year old to teach discipline, patience and good character. Baseball,after all, didn't start until the spring.
Karate seemed like a good fit after an unfortunate trip to the principals office. We were called for a parent, principal, teacher meeting to discuss the pattern of behavior over last two weeks.
It was raining, it was November, and my husband and I were awaiting our scheduled meeting. 8:20, A time that made sense only in school systems and hospitals, that would "give us time to grab a cup of coffee after drop off." Apparently, other parents can eat at times such as this.
"In all my years of school, I NEVER went to the principals office." I yelled into the back seat of the car over the soundtrack of High School Musical 1.
My husband drove quietly toward the school.
I worried that he could get "kicked out" of Kindergarten. Was that even possible?
I thought back to the incidents stemmed from circumstances relating to that fine line.
"Why did you stand on top of the art table?" I had asked.
"To be funny, I was trying to be funny" he insisted. That was strike one.
Of course, he got the reaction from his peers, and the attention of the principal, whom he had a "chat with" and apparently enjoyed.
"Why did you push the girl in your class." I asked.
"She was in my way, and I got to go to the principals office." He answered candidly.
Hmmm. 'Got to go to the principals office' wasn't in my vocabulary at that age.
Strike three, well, I won't go into the details, but it involved a pencil and an arm that was apparently, 'in his way'.
It was 8:20 and we sunk into the armed chairs next to the glass-fronted beverage fridge stuffed with Red Bull.
"What is going on?" his teacher asked, seemingly as shocked at the radical behavior change as we were.
Back and forth, we discussed home life, school life, during which time the principal was quiet, weighing the situation.
"I think" he finally said, "his behavior is related to the attention he gets, positive or negative."
And we flipped it upside down. Attention for positive, not so much for negative, which worked.
I squirmed uncomfortably in my chair at Karate, where my son was randomly falling down and not getting into formation quickly enough. The teacher was joking with him, unknowingly goading him on. I tried to avoid the hostile stare of one woman whose much younger son had perfected attentiveness, intimating that my son was disrupting class.
He was.
I thought about that fine line between having fun, and needing to be disciplined. How do you discuss that with a five year old? Because frankly, like the rest of us, he is still finding his way.