Saturday, November 30, 2013

Play Date

Theresa Oldham: "It is time to go home now?"
Theresa: Why are those kids fighting?
And will I get to do that when I grow up?


I went to pick up my play date (Michael) at Miranda’s and he was just finishing off a morning event with Theresa and Kalina.

Lurene was getting ready to go home.

I arrived at the exact moment when toys were being put away and coats and hats were going on the children.

Michael and Theresa were having a dispute about his penguin pair – a mother and a baby, which have never been played with.

 But mimetic desire had overcome both of them.

They were vying for possession, each wanting both of the penguins.
Kalina doing a dead weight flop in her mother's arms
to protect her penquin rights.
It is not that there weren’t plenty of other toys in the room, the best being a Christmas tree Miranda bought at IKEA – the tree and the decorations, all of which a child can put on the tree and take off at will.

Now that is a good tree – tinsel garlands, beads, hanging ornaments, all child proof.

But the tree wasn’t interesting either of them. Just those penguins, delicious because the other wanted them.
Alice: My biggest problem is sitting upright on the couch.

I walked to the car with Lurene and she tried to trade off a book for the penguin so that it could go back in my pocket and into the house.

And that is how I took Michael and a penguin for a walk later. The penguin just happened to be in my pocket.

In the back of my mind was a paragraph I read last night in the book Aging Well.

The author tried to say that old people can find as much happiness in hours spent with a grandchild, as they could formerly find doing hostile take-overs.

The author must have had his tongue in cheek.

Michael: "a pause for a picture
and then I am off to get both of those penguins"
My hostile take-overs were taking back and doing the jobs I had given to others.

.

Arta

2 comments:

  1. Such lovely grandchildren we have Arta. You know the mothers of my grandchildren do not even know when you and I put the grandchildren pictures up on the blog. I guess they are too busy making playdates.

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  2. There are a lot of cute little faces out there. This is the season when their eyes are filled with wonder. I took out my nutcrackers and Michael wanted to play with them. I was showing him how the mechanism would open and shut. Then I put my finger in the mouth of the nutcracker and yelled ouch when Michael shut it. He didn't want to have anything more to do with that again, ... and it wasn't even his finger that got pinched.

    I like watching the little ones explore all of the Christmas splendors.

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