Lion and Magic Boy

Yes, it’s a word if I say it is. It is!

Is too.

Oh, and don’t mind me. I am learning to touch type, after all this time. It’s going quite well, actually! Here, I’ll show you: thd id where I type tbe worjf “aeseinre”. [translation: this is where I type the word "awesome"] See? Not bad, eh?

It’s raining today. Usually when it rains here where I live, it rains. Like all day. Not the all-day for three or four days straight of northern California where I grew up, but just all day. Real rain that is hard to ignore.

It was raining this morning when I took Eric to his bus. He was poised on the porch, thinking about the three steps down and his role in navigating them, and I offered to carry him to the bus thinking I would get less wet that way. Nope, not a chance, he’d prefer to walk himself, thank you. I was reminded that he practically runs now, while just a year ago he wasn’t even close to walking.

A few minutes later it was time to walk Serena down to her bus stop and wait with her there. We donned rain coats and hats and while we walked the, what is it, 50 yards or so, we talked about how much we like to be out in the rain. I was a little surprised that only one lone kid was there but figured maybe people were waiting till the last minute. Usually we are the last to arrive at the bus stop, and we stand near the edge of the little knot of people, parents socializing while their kids shuffle nervously awaiting the bus.

Just the one kid, holding a lime green umbrella, wearing a light jacket that wasn’t even zipped. Brr. He said he wasn’t cold. Soon we were joined by two other kids: a girl with no rain coat, no hat and no umbrella who said she liked getting wet, and another shorter kid who never spoke and come to think of it never l showed his face. Umbrella kid is fairly gregarious, it turns out. I still don’t know his name but I know a lot of other things about him now. Kids like it when adults talk to them like people.

Standing there, my shoes slowly becoming wetter and wetter (they’re not even close to waterproof, it turns out)(the nondescript leather slipons), I enjoyed the feeling of the rain on me. On my coat, actually.

Eventually the bus came, but no one else ever joined us. I noticed several cars idling nearby and saw no-hat girl’s mother in one. One kid materialized from nowhere, probably one of the cars, when the bus arrived. The other cars seemed to contain the rest of the waiting parents. Who drove to the bus stop 50 feet from their doors and idled there for ten minutes. I was the only parent who waited with the kids in the rain. I wondered where everyone else was. I walked back through the rain after Serena got on the bus and as I opened my door, the neighbor was coming out of their house.

“The bus just left,” stating the obvious, but helpfully. (I’m such a good neighbor.)

“I know, we’re driving,” she replied.

It’s easier to pile two kids into a car and drive ten minutes there and ten minutes waiting to drop off and then ten minutes back again than it is to wait in the rain for a bit?

You should see these people when it snows.

And! Just to recap, I am awesome because I stood out in the rain with four kids while the other parents stayed dry in their cars.

[Fist pump] Yessss!