MY SON, Julian, aged 41/2, has received a love letter.

Rummaging through his school bag one day, I found a mysterious, crumpled piece of paper: It was a Ministry of Manpower document about vehicle and equipment inspections.

As I drew it out cautiously and unfolded it, I saw that there was something scrawled in a child's large, confident hand in pen on the back - "I love you, Juliwen", it read.

The missive was signed - with a big, cheery heart - "Ashlee and my sister", and decorated with shiny stickers.

Wow, I thought, he's such a grumpy, taciturn little guy, and there are girls interested in him? Maybe, I'll have to shoo 'em away from my younger, friendlier and more easy-going son, Lucien, with a stick in future.

Later, I hovered outside Julian's Kindergarten 1 classroom to get a glimpse of sweet Ashlee with the comely penmanship.

She turned out to be a gorgeous babe, with her brown hair kept back with a fashionable leopard- print Alice band.

I waved at her and she shyly waved back. For a moment, I was an old-fashioned Chinese matriarch checking out a potential daughter-in-law. Then, I came to my senses and scurried away so that the teachers could get on with the activities.

My heart swelled a little with pride at the idea of my goofy, non-chivalrous son (he never bothers to remember his female classmates' names, and wants to have play dates only with the blokes) snagging the attention of such a cute girl.

The adorable episode also opened my eyes to how young kids mature at warp speed, even as us parents are still under the illusion that preschool is more about crayons than lipstick. Already, an innocently flirtatious atmosphere of first crushes has been percolating under our noses.

Walking home from school with me one day, Julian is hailed from afar by a pint-sized lady carrying a pink bag.

"Bye!" he yelled back at her, before turning to me and saying: "E (another boy in his class) likes her."

He made the remark so casually, so matter-of-factly, that I wasn't quite sure if he meant "like" in an admiring sense, or "like" as in "I like ice cream".

Dig into the depths of your memory and you'd probably unearth a gem or two about partners of the opposite sex from the nursery or beyond. When I recounted my discovery of Julian's cool-dude appeal to a friend, K, she told me immediately about her boyfriend in kindergarten.

"He was so gentlemanly, he would kiss my hand chastely," she added.

I swear, we both misted over with wistfulness.

Look up "childhood crushes" online, and you'd invariably land on some forum or other in which parents or pop psychologists discuss the impact of the media on how kids perceive and mimic portrayals of romantic relationships.

That said, there are people who believe that puppy love is an unavoidable fact of nature - teen dramas or no.

One sensible way to deal with kindergarten attachments and heartbreak is to listen and ask tactful questions about your child's crush at school, and discuss with them what they're learning through such a friendship.

It is an invaluable opportunity to broach the subject of managing one's emotions, and for them to think about how they want to treat others and be treated in turn.

On the UrbanMamas parenting website, a netizen who signs off as Mara Collins posted: "I cross my fingers and hope that, when that day comes, when my sons are ready for more serious romantic relationships, the practice they had in schoolyards will help them understand that they are looking for things much like what they would look for in friendships."

So, really, I'm not going into a maternal tailspin over Julian's love letter. Instead, I'm going to make him compose a nice, neat Valentine's Day card for Ashlee.

After all, if a lady deigns to go to the trouble of writing for you, the gentlemanly thing to do is to reply.

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