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Trails

Wednesday 11 July 2012

This summer vacation provides me with the first real opportunity in a long time to spend a great deal of daily time with the Girl. As such, I try to do something out of the ordinary with her every chance I get. It’s a good reminder for her of her continued importance in our family despite our shift in attention during the last eight weeks.

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Today, we try a new path at a park fairly new to us. We’d explored the north side of the park’s trails; today, we hit the south side, sounding out signs as we marched.

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It’s an odd trail. To the right we see a lake and accompanying wetlands — a vision of nature’s riches.

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To the left, a view of humanity’s poverty: trailers and virtual shanties. It’s an odd combination, made even stranger by the fact that one of the old homes has a BMW in the driveway. Perhaps a question of priorities: one’s peers don’t have to see one’s house, but one’s car is always on show.

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At the end of our walk, an observation point that juts out into the wetland area made even wetter by the copious rainfall of the last few days.

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We sit for a while, sharing a pack of crackers and sipping on water, careful not to litter (“The wind could blow the plastic away!” someone explains) and commenting on the various blooms reeds.

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During our hike out, with the Girl clasping her hands behind her back, there’s only one thing to do: let her lead.

Tools of the Trades

Tuesday 10 July 2012

We saw them in the morning as we were heading to summer ballet: a company from Georgia was digging up portions of the street and shoulder to lay pipe. There were various vehicles for digging, grading, and flattening, and I proposed, “After ballet we could walk up here and watch them use those big machines.”

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We decided it might be a good photo opportunity, so I took our big camera and L took our small camera, telling jokes on the walk to the top of our street where we’d seen them working. I hoped it might inspire the Girl to take pictures of something other than the ground, her favorite subject.

When we arrived, though, the workers had already left. Their various tractors stood idle, some of their cabs enclosed in pad-locked sheets of metal. “Perhaps they begin early in the morning to avoid the heat,” I suggested. Still, we decided to look around, first examining an old Ford tractor’s street brush attachment.

“Know what this is for?” I asked.

“It’s wire!” was the answer.

“Yes, but what do you think they use it for?”

A shrug. “Dunno.” (Where did that come from? Where does she pick up all these things? Is she a sponge?)

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Photo by the Girl

“They use use it to clean the street.” I paused. “Funny, huh?”

Giggles for a moment, then she exclaimed, “I need to take a picture of that.” She took two, both of them fairly well composed for the Girl’s thrust-camera-forward-and-click photo composition method.

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Photo by the Girl

And of course, being the photo-geek I am, I had to take a picture of her taking pictures.

“Why is it blue?” she asked.

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“Because they wanted to make it your favorite color” I replied. She gave me that look she’s now mastered that says clearly, “There’s no way I believe that.”

She clarified: “But why isn’t it all blue?”

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Photo by the Girl

“I don’t know,” I responded, hoping that would be the end of it. Accepting the limits of my knowledge is something that takes time for the Girl. Later in life, we refer to this as the realization of one’s father’s mortality; for now, it’s simply impossible that Tata doesn’t know everything.

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Yet I do know how to operate a camera, and lately L has become more aware of being the object of photos, and so it was today. Pictures were posing events.

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New locations, new shots. New questions, new fears overcome. Each day with the Girl can be filled with surprises.

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And there was even a bit of role playing.

Snakes Alive!

Monday 9 July 2012

Mention “snake” or “reptile” and a lot of people have very negative reactions, from shudders to shouts and just about everything in between. Snakes are probably one of the most feared animals in existence, but it’s an odd reality: most are relatively harmless.

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Yet it’s really a taught fear, in some cases on purpose. It makes sense in a way: most people can’t tell the difference between venomous and non-venomous snakes, so it’s only natural to teach a child to stay away from all snakes at all costs.

Fortunately, I’ve never really had a fear of snakes. Indeed, they’ve always fascinated me. I’d like my children to have the same attitude I have: a healthy respect for snakes in the wild (i.e., never touch them) and an understanding that snakes in captivity are another question altogether. If, for example, a lecturer comes with dozens of snakes and lizards and offers the children an opportunity to touch and even, with adult help, to hold the snakes, I’d take the gentleman up on his offer, which is just what happened today.

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Ron Cromer, with his Snakes Alive program, came to a local library as a reward for kids participating in the summer reading program. According to the program’s web site,

Many people who enjoy nature become profoundly distressed upon encountering a snake. Some folks feel that the only good snake is a dead snake. Learning about snakes provides an opportunity to replace fear and misconception with knowledge. It is our goal to provide knowledge and a safe opportunity to meet these reptiles in hopes of alleviating some fear.

Kids learned about how to distinguish venomous and non-venomous snakes in the area and had a chance to replace some of the old myths (snakes are slimy, cold, dangerous) with some new-found realities. To that end and with adult help, seventy or so kids got the chance to touch snakes and even hold them if they were willing.

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I volunteered with the other adults to help out with the snakes, thinking it would be a great chance to help the Girl develop a healthy attitude about snakes. She was willing to touch but was not interested in holding.

And this was certainly the case with the star of the show, Rosie, an enormous python that Cromer, by law, has to keep doubly contained, in a duffle bag that’s pad-locked in a wooden trunk.

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The routine was to be simple: eight adults would initially hold Rosie while providing kids with the opportunity to touch her and even help hold her. But first, we had to get her out,

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which was a multi-step process

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that seemed never-ending

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as we pulled and added person after person,

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until finally, we had the whole, enormous Rosie out. Once we were all solidly in possession of our bit of snake (“Have some snake,” Cromer said has he guided us in Rosie’s extraction), our host informed us that we were in fact to lift the snake above our heads for full effect.

I thought he was joking.

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He wasn’t.

The Girl, by this time, had fled to the “Snake-free Zone” Cromer had set up for kids and adults (mainly the latter) who didn’t really feel comfortable being near snakes. It wasn’t so much the snakes that drove her there as the crowd: a large group of people means almost instant uneasiness for her. And if that’s what she takes away from the day, that people are much more threatening than snakes, then it was definitely a success.

Photos with me in them were taken by a neighbor who met us there.

Eviction Notice

Sunday 8 July 2012

A few years ago, we had our first problem with yellow jackets. I took the problem very seriously. Well, somewhat seriously.

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In short, I was terrified. I didn’t want to get stung, and I had this vision of them swarming out of their hole to attack, hence the layers and layers and layers.

Recently, a new batch took up residence in our front yard. I took things a little less seriously than I did in 2007. I threw an old window screen over the hole at dusk and went at them through the screen. Still, I was cautious, wearing jeans, long sleeves, and boots.

And so yesterday, I chanced upon our third nest of visitors. I’d inadvertently run over the nest a couple of times with the mower, so we were well on our way to making friends already.

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This morning, I gave them a housewarming present: three gallons of boiling water.

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A few more gallons in the early evening and I think they’ve got the point.

If only I could leave pheromone signs up: “You’re welcome to hang out here, but build your nest in a far corner of the backyard, well away from anywhere my children would be likely to play.”

Fright

Saturday 7 July 2012

We spent the evening with adult friends, which means the Girl got to watch more television than she normally does. In a string of semi-guided clicks and choices, she ended up watching a made-for-TV “family” movie, Princess: A Modern Fairy Tale. It was a typical modern story, with a couple of lines of almost-sexual innuendo that I decided I would sit with the Girl and watch a fairly simplistic story about a “princess” (I never quite understood why she had to be a modern-day “princess” in an American urban center other than the fact that it allowed others to think her a freak.) who in fact is the healer for all the mythical creatures that in fact aren’t: in other words, unicorns, mermaids, and fairies actually exist but a handful of people are aware of the simple fact.

At one point, there was a scene with a hydra-like creature attacking an unbeliever (who quickly came to believe in hydras, unicorns and such), and as quickly as one could imagine, the Girl was in my arms.

“I’m scared,” she said.

I went through the usual statements of fact — “It’s just a movie” and the like — but I knew what was coming at bed time.

“Daddy, I think I need someone to sleep with me,” she said in all earnestness. I comforted her, assured her of the safety of our home, and a thousand other things. She calmed down, but a few minutes later she called me back, in tears. After repeating the process, I returned a few minutes later to find her sound asleep. I wondered briefly at the fears she had held at bay long enough to drift to sleep, and I realized what a brave girl she can be.

Fascination

Friday 6 July 2012

The Boy has become fascinated with a small cow, a singing, vibrating cow that includes a soundtrack of children giggling to the silly song.

Afternoon Relax

It’s tempting to say, “It’s just his tendency to look to the right.” Yet the fact that it calms him almost instantaneously indicates there’s something more to it.

Cat Toy

Thursday 5 July 2012

“I’m making a play area for the cat,” the Girl explains.

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If only her idea of playing with the cat included gentleness: she might have more success.

The Helper

Wednesday 4 July 2012

When we brought the Boy home, the Girl was eager to begin helping. Granted, she’s always interested in helping–in name, anyway–but a baby brother is especially tempting. So we did the logical: we put her on pacifier duty.

The Boy

Wednesday 4 July 2012

I’ve finally gotten to the video shot during the Boy’s birthday. Granted, it took almost two months, but in the end, it’s the final product that counts.

The Dress

Tuesday 3 July 2012

Before our wedding, K and I took ballroom dancing course classes. We learned all sorts of moves we’ve now forgotten — rumba, English waltz, Foxtrot, cha-cha, tango, and a few others. We focused especially on the waltz, for newly wedded couples are expected to have the first dance at their wedding party, and it is always a waltz. We learned some fancy steps, some turns, twirls, and all sorts of things to make us look like we knew what we were doing.

And then K chose a dress that restricted her shoulder movement, allowing her to raise her hands to just below her shoulders. Out went all the fancy moves.

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In, however, came the possibility of the smiles when K suggests to L that she try on the dress.

“Your wedding dress?” she asked incredulously.

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In doing so, K created a new metric of growth and, if we remember, a new tradition.

“We can have you try this on every year to see how you grow,” K suggested.

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Still, perhaps once is enough: seeing my little girl in a wedding dress, no matter how ill-fitting the dress and how innocent the poses, was a bit stressful to a father.