2 Steps Forward, 1 Step Back

January 09, 2006 | Category: Family, It's a Trip

Saturday was just about perfect.

After he got home from Karate, my waiter, Monsieur Bear, arrived at my bedside with his Spiderman clipboard and his Crayola Marker to take my breakfast order.

I sleepily requested eggs, scrambled. What I got was half a fruit rollup, and a fascinating array of snack foods including popcorn (CD was drafted to help there). And a glass of ice water in a flower vase.

Delicious, really.

But even that elegant sufficiency and the comfort of our sea of bedclothes and pillows weren't enough to keeps us inside for long. And off we ventured into the wild blue yonder of... downtown Oak Park.

We hit the diner for a second breakfast. While Bear flirted easily with the waitress (batting his baby blues and tossing them his famous crooked grin), CD and I dug into a meal that reminded us why we don't eat at diners much - oy, the grease.

Then we happily walked into the blustery wind of the umpteenth (rough approximation) of steely, windy weather. We ducked into the paint-a-plate place, something we'd never done before (although Happy Montessori has happily engaged Bear in ceramics before). Whiled away a warm hour engrossed in colors and textures as we fumbled our paintbrushes onto naked forms. Amateurish with bright colors and sloppy technique, we cheerfully forked over a king's ransom to have them all fired over the next week.

Bear, meanwhile, was done with his projects fairly quickly and had time left over as CD and I finished ours to make conversation with the staff, chat with some classmates who happened by, and carefully replace our paints to their rightful spots.

Afterwards, we strolled along, window shopping, until finally ducking into an ice cream shop with windblown hair and big eyes. In front of us, they blended the ice cream with candy bars or chocolate chips. The result was such a rich yummy dessert that neither Bear nor I could manage even half our small cups.

(CD manfully was able to demolish his.)

It was dust when we got home, but not too late for a long winter's nap.

I was struck by how nice the day had been. How we'd enjoyed each other's company had so much fun - laughing and creating and walking in the breezes.

Then today...

Wait.

No. I have decided to stop here. For the next 24 hours, there will only be good news. Agreed? Can we all get together on that one?

OK, then.

Thank you.

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