growing
It's been a while since we had any sports in the front yard. Lately, though, the Boy has been asking to head out to play soccer in the front yard a little. With the time change, this is likely to increase -- at least I hope so.
It, too, will be gone before we know it.
The Girl was heading out to Target.
"I want to go, too!" the Boy exclaimed.
What was going to be the reaction? She's often reticent to take him anywhere, but surprisingly she simply said, "Well, you can come with me."
So our children went clothes shopping alone.
When the Girl decided she wanted to play volleyball, when she tried out for the team as a sixth grader and didn't make it, when she became really determined, she'd come ask me, "Padre" (She'd started calling me that by then) "can we go out to the front yard and practice volleyball?" I'd toss her balls, simulate spikes, help her practice running for balls -- all the basic skills someone of my eager volleyball means could help with given our lack of a net.
At some point, she asked me for the last time to go help her practice. I didn't realize it was the last time she would ask me, and to be honest, I don't know if I even agreed to it. She might have asked, and I might have made some kind of excuse. Or maybe we went and practiced one last time.
She hasn't asked me to do that in years now. She probably never will again. The last time, passed without knowing, fully past with complete knowledge.
So when the Boy asked if, instead of swimming tonight, we could practice basketball, I agreed. I didn't really want to: I wanted to get some serious exercise in the pool. But he's that age: how many more times will he ask? When will be the last time?
Where did this come from? The last time I remember doing this with him -- I can't even recall. Two years ago? More? Less?
L insists that the boys are too old now to have play dates.
"They just hangout!" she explains with exasperation.
"What about you? Do you have play dates?"
[L rolls her eyes...]
Today, our Boy finished elementary school. "I mean, I have to go three more days after that," he explained to me the other day, "but once I get that piece of paper, I'm basically done."
Our daughter has two more years of high school; our son starts middle school next year...
The Boy is no longer a Cub Scout. That's over -- a whole phase of his life behind him. Tonight was his first meeting as a Boy Scout.
There was the requisite paperwork -- which he filled out. "This is all you, little man," I told him with a smile.
They started the meeting with introductions to the troop: "We'd like to invite our newest scouts to introduce themselves and tell us a little bit about them." E stepped forward, shyly as always, and said, "I'm E. I like soccer and guitar." After introductions, the new scouts went out with some of the older boys to learn the ropes, so to speak.
So different than Cub Scouts. Boy-run, boy-planned, boy-approved. "We're just there to make sure they do everything safely," the scoutmaster told us when we first visited back in December.
We parents didn't see the kids until they were done, wrapping everything up with their circle. In fact, tonight is likely the only night we'll stay through the whole thing. "Most parents just drop them off and then pick them up later," the assistant scoutmaster told us new parents.
"This is going to do the Boy so much good," I told K.
We spent the evening downtown, the five of us -- the two kids and the dog. It's so rare that everyone's schedules work out to let us do something like this. We'll take every opportunity we have.
Our stroll eventually led us down to the river and the new Grand Bohemian hotel which is the latest highlight of the ever-developing downtown Greenville.
Eventually we made it down the the rocky area of the river just at the edge of the main downtown park, the place both of our kids loved to run about on the rocks as little kids.
"Those days are long gone" K and I constantly remind ourselves. And yet, every now and then, the stars align,
the kids are both fascinated with the same thing, and for a brief moment, we pop back a few years in the past.
The Girl has slowly disappeared from this site though not for lack of interest on my part. She's reticent to have photos taken; she is often not at home in the evenings, either at practice, the gym, the library, or just going to visit friends; the things we talk about don't result in cute exchanges anymore but just honest sharing with each other -- when she's willing to share. She is, in short, a typical sixteen-year-old, and her withdrawal from this site mirrors a bit of a withdrawal from family life into her own, growing life.
So when she accepted an invitation this evening to come downstairs and play a board game with E and me, the temptation to take a picture was great, but I knew it would ruin the moment. K probably did, too, and didn't even try a stealth shot. Instead, the three of us sat and played Sequence, chatting about nothing of any significance, just spending some time together. I played without a care, randomly placing my pieces with only the occasional intent -- usually to block L's pending sequence. She won anyway (she always wins board games), and though I would have played another, neither child was interested.
"Are they both just humoring me?" I thought as they walked away.
I keep repeating myself: X is always a highlight of our time in Polska. When you come here only every few years, I guess everything becomes a highlight. Still, going to Pyzowka to visit K’s dearest friend D and her family has to count as a highlight no matter how you define it.
D is the type of friend you have that, no matter how much time has passed since your last visit, the years disappear in an instant and except for the topics of conversation, your relationship feels little different than it did when you were in high school together. These days, you might talk about the cost of your child applying to college versus the cost of your child going to college if you lived in the states. You might talk about friends that only one of you has seen in the last twenty years and how they’ve changed or not changed. You might talk about the cost of heating your house this year as opposed to last year. These are discussions your parents would have had years ago, but now you have them.
Before you know it, your children will be having them as well. But for now, your children are happy jumping on the trampoline and playing with a puppy. The cost of heating is as distant to them as it was to you when you were their age. They hear your discussions, but they don’t pay much attention to them.
Then again, neither did you.