matching tracksuits

Packing is never fun. It can hold the promise of coming adventure, but generally it’s tedious.

That being said, it requires a ritual. I always had one: listen to Michael Hedges’ Taproot (AMG) while packing. I packed for almost all my trips for ten years that way.

We didn’t listen to anything packing for this trip. And K did most of the packing. And ironing.

I offered to help. “No — I’m afraid that you might forget something important.”

“Like the Girl?” I think, but then think again.

But all that’s behind us now. This is scheduled to be posted when — theoretically — we’re lifting off the ground on a Lufthansa Airbus, beginning the first (and longest) leg of our journey.

It almost goes without saying, but it is obviously the main reason we’re going back to Poland.

A death in the family brought about the realization that time spent with family is time best spent.

Only a few hours to go until the reunion.

There is a swing in K’s folks’ backyard that is more of a pendulum than a swing. The seat hangs by iron rods rather than chains, and as such, it has an arch a little different than what swing enthusiasts are probably used to — if there is a Swing Enthusiast Association of America.

L likes to swing. She also, it turns out, likes to slide.

Yesterday afternoon, we took her to a new park — new for us, at any rate — and she could not get enough of the sliding boards. Nor could she get enough of the small climbing wall leading up to one of the slides:

And of course slides and climbing walls weren’t the only attractions:

In two days, I tell her, we’ll be swinging “u Babci i dziadka.”

A few weeks ago we kept some friends’ dogs for the week. I realized anew why I prefer cats.

If pets were animals, Bogart would play cats while dogs would be played by Jim Carey.

In Polska, L will be exposed to a whole new world of music, hopefully. Granted, we do try to expose her to traditional Polish music here in the house, but to hear it live…

Right now, she’s fond of “Gloria in excelsis Deo” from Vivaldi’s Gloria. I play it in the car and she just swings her head back in forth in time with the music. Once the exciting beginning is over, she makes the sign for “More” and says her own special version of the word: ma.

She’s excited during the first part, but the second — “Et in terra pax” calms her down significantly. We played it in the car last night and a minute into the piece, she was looking calmly out the window.