Kids' Music

Day 220: Kids' Music

The shelves upstairs are still yielding little things from past times. A signed version of Teaching Hippopotami to Fly by the Chenille Sisters. Magic School Bus Dinosaurs (oh, how Sam loved dinosaurs!). I Spy. 

No more cross country trips with books on tape played over and over, or the same videotape played over and over, or the Chenille Sisters played over and over. I can still recite the book The White Cat from memory ("You are nothing but a white...cat") and sing all the words to "A You're Adorable," and speak the lines along with James Cromwell in Babe ("That'll do, pig"). The kids listen to their own music now, with headphones. off in the zone.

It doesn't seem long ago that they were toddling along on unsteady feet, with diaper-fat butts and chubby little ankles and shorts that went below their knees, or reaching up to ride the Razor scooter set at the lowest height, or stopping at the street corner because they weren't allowed to cross on their own, or climbing the tree between our house and Barbara's house next door to put letters in the wooden box they'd stowed up in the branches.

I'm guessing that I'll have grandchildren in fewer years than it's been since we last listened to the Magic School Bus. Should I keep these things for them?

Sam, Rich and I spent some time this afternoon filling our street-side compost container with leaves, as we've done every Sunday for several weeks. It's a pleasant task, with the sun shining, the crisp yellow leaves clean and sweet-smelling, and the autumn light soft and clear like champagne bubbles. We spent about 45 minutes at it, and then Sam went back to his homework and NFL game, up in our finished attic, as he has does every week when we are finished with our leaf-clearing chore.

Later, I saw a young mother in her front yard with two pre-school aged kids, raking fallen leaves into piles. Not long ago, we'd rake our own leaves into giant piles, not wasting them in the composter but turning them into an afternoon's entertainment. We'd fling ourselves into the leaf piles, over and over, laughing, throwing leaves into the air so they'd glint in the sun, getting covered from head to foot with crisp little pieces.

Soon enough, winter will be here.