Schwimmen Gehen Mit Der Gabe

The Scene:  Swim Kids Montessori - Guadalupe & Price

The Players:  Four mothers, one grandfather, and their respective charges

The Action:  The huddling sideways-looking mothers are like a Greek chorus, as one admonishing their progeny to step slowly, gently, carefully, wait! wait! one toe at a time into the water.  Lexy!!  Amber!!  Don't hurry.  Be careful.  No, no!, be more careful.  Slower, more slowly.  Slower yet!

Grandson and grandfather observe this silliness.  Knowing looks are exchanged between men. 

Grandson looks deep into grandfather's eye, says with the elegant simplicity of youth, "I'm Going In."  Subtle nod from the aged one, affirming, approving.

Four accelerating steps and SPAAAAALOOOOOOOSH!!!!!!!!

Shrieks of indignation, gasps, askance stares and sotto voce defamations among the aghast mothers.  Snorfling snickers from the grandfather. 

I may not have mentioned it, but this kid is ok by me.

A Day at the DMV

People have been telling me for years, twelve in fact, that I shouldn't have my social security number on my driver license.  Thursday I remedied that.  As I sat and waited along with the unwashed masses, I noticed I had a seat very close to the restrooms.  I noticed because, in that hour and a half waiting period, four different times people came out of the restroom breezing past my seat trailing the unmistakable sweet tinged backwash of marijuana.  Almost got a buzz just sitting there.

The other reason was that I last renewed on Halloween in '93.  That doesn't seem significant in itself, except that everyone working at the DMV that day was in costume, many of them on purpose, it appeared.  There was much joshing and kidding, and as I stepped on the line to have my visage purloined for permanent identification for the next decade or so, someone pushed a button that blared an ear-splitting blood curdling scream. 

My not-unexpected reaction was to break into an ear-to-ear grimace, referred to thenceforth by my beloved as "The Whoopie Cushion Face."  At numerous airports across this great land and at least three others, Persons behind counters have squinted at my license, peered at me, squinted, peered (I wore contact lenses at the time, enhancing every aspect of this ridiculous Alfred E Newman grin) until I've offered, "Do I have to do the face?"

No longer.  I have a newly minted picture, more like my day-to-day glower than some hyenic snark, and my social security number will now be known only to those who ask.

Omaha

Spent a few days last week in and around my old stompin' grounds.  Ostensibly the visit was to be of assistance to my baby brother who had rotator cuff surgery last Monday, and to visit my ever-ailing father.  Idea was that Blood would be laid low, scarcely able to move, and I would nurse him back to a semblance of mobility, and while he was in the arms of Sister Morpheus, I'd visit my dad and compliment him on his walker and on the entirety of his Joel Osteen collection.

I arrove the day after my brother's surgery to find him chipper as a tree full of squirrels and my father newly readmitted to the hospital from yet another fall that left him bruised all over and bleeding from his ear. 

My brother gave me the keys to his Acura S-type and we set off for the mandatory LaCasa pizza dinner.  I was housed in the Presidential Suite of his palatial estate, which in many homes is called a basement.  Not so on Meadow Road.  To be brief, the subterranean level has about the same square footage as my entire house.  Comfy bed, full audio-visual system, full gym, whirlpool, fireplace, even a juke box.  It was so dark and quiet that the least I slept each night there was more than eight hours - a not inconsiderable feat for moi.

Back to the presupposed invalid.  The kid gots no whine to him.  His surgery consisted of eight small incisions where they went in and stirred his shoulder with a scalpel.  He wore a sling with a thick pad at waist level, keeping his arm not rigid, but confined to small, non-stretching movements.  The pad was so thick we agreed it could be easily modified to hold a few beers and a cup-holder.  But the guy never said one word of self pity.  Wouldn't even take a pain pill until late in the day.  One wonders if he really is his father's child, what with the astonishing self sufficiency factor.

Anyway, I visited my old pal Noll, got to see his fabulous new home, got to go to the Henry Doorly Zoo for a special up close and personal showing by one of the female gorillas, had a demonstration of how to make baby orangutans, thoughtfully right up by the window (hey, it is spring) and got more sleep in three nights than I usually get in four.  Maybe it was the pace of the place.

Spokane

You gotta love a community whose signature beer is called Moose Drool.  This is a beautiful area, not too big, but has all the amenities.

We had  perfect weather Friday and Saturday, and played two of the nicest municipal golf courses ever, Indian Canyon and Qualchan.  Excellent food in restaurants along the Spokane river, mediocre rooms at the Hotel Lusso.  Breakfast yesterday in Coeur d'Alene on the golf course.  Back last night to two sulking cats and a house that took almost four hours to cool down. 

Gabe

Gabe has been running through a patch of rough road lately.  Wouldn't come out of the pool even following the most strident commands from his parents; can't seem to stop a forbidden action, such as throwing something, once he's started to cock his arm; unusual abrupt noises, disturbing to his mother, mostly, erupt at amazing volume, usually in tight quarters.  He's growing even more.  Today was "graduation" at Montessori where all the little people get a certificate and a hug, and blow out a candle.  In the picture taking line-up, my little guy was the least little of all. 

S bought the series of "Bob" books that I use when I volunteer to teach kids reading there, and they arrived yesterday.  G read them, rapt, until his mother finally made him turn out the light and go to sleep.

I think it's that so many things are going on in his mind and his body right now, that it's amazing he can keep any of it straight.  Synapses firing in new ways, muscles building, new realizations. 

This is really fun.  I'd like it to slow down.  All of it.