Today's long, quiet morning was punctuated with a long, slow walk with the girls. Actually, the walk was less a walk than the serial alteration of standstills and brief strolls. It took Genevieve and me on foot, and Julia on her scooter nearly ninety minutes to walk 8/10ths of a mile around two blocks. That's slow, man. Very slow. Frustratingly slow, at the time. Any slower, and time would have run backwards, making me younger when we got back home than I had been when I left.
I tried to keep a good perspective on this slow pace. On the one hand, everyone knows a four-year-old needs a lot of time to inspect interesting rocks, collect beautiful leaves, ask questions about certain houses, et cetera. And a two-year-old needs a lot of time to watch her sister inspect, collect, ask, et cetera. On the other hand, do I have to explain again why we can't just stroll onto someone's lawn and pick their day lillies? I guess I do.
My poor attitude notwithstanding, the girls still had fun. We met some new neighbors, to whom Julia spoke very politely and nicely (telling them how old she and her sister were); Vivi exclaimed, "Uh-oh! Boo-boos!" when a rusted-out junker car rumbled past us; both girls waved at almost every other car that went by; Julia threw her worshipful stare at the "big girl" (an eight-year-old) who rode her scooter around us; and, yes, they collected a trove of "berries," leaves, sticks, and rocks - all, today, sharing a maroon-ish hue.