Some days getting the kids outside is a challenge. Once they are outside, they generally are okay, but the initial push is always hard. Who can blame them? These days there are screens and cozy couches and a room overflowing with toys and books to keep them indoors. But I know everyone feels so much better when we get outside, so I push as hard as I can. I start with one child – bathroom, coat, hat, gloves, boots, out the door into the back yard – then move on to the next, and then the next, and then myself, hoping against hope that by the time I get the baby bundled and my own coat on, the first child to go outside has not tired of it and is wanting to come inside.
The other day – one of those drizzly wet days that we’ve gotten quite a few of this winter – a glance at the forecast seemed to indicate that the morning drizzle was as dry as it was going to get. Drizzly walk was better than soaking wet walk, I thought. (Though, truth be told, I am discovering that my kids actually find a run in a torrential rain quite fun.) The eight year old was in class, so it was just me and the three year old and the baby. And there was much resistance from the three year old.
He didn’t want to go out.
It was too wet.
He didn’t like his boots.
He wanted to stay inside and read books.
and so on.
“Let’s just go for a short walk,” I say. “We will just go around the block.”
A walk around the block in the drizzle would be doable, I thought. The baby can manage that so I wouldn’t have to get the stroller out. We would keep to our block so probably won’t encounter any people. Regardless it would probably be our only chance for fresh air that day.
“Okay, fine,” the three year old finally agreed.
So boots, coat, and out the door.
We walked down the street. And then stopped to splash in a tiny puddle. Stomp stomp stomp, went the three year old. Stomp stomp stomp, went the baby.
And then there were sticks and leaves to drop into the gutter and watch as the rainwater carried it away.
And then there was the search for the perfect stick to grasp. Each stick on the ground must be examined and compared to the one in hand.
And then we stopped to read license plates of the cars in the driveways we passed. It’s a good way to practice numbers and letters for the three year old. An colours too, as we point out yellow cars and white cars.
And then we stop to watch the UPS truck pull up and deliver packages.
And next was the white postal truck. “A new postal truck, just like mine!” the three year old exclaims. Last year he received a toy postal truck for Christmas and he still gets very excited to see its real life doppelganger.
And then there was the worm- just a regular old earthworm in the middle of the sidewalk. We squatted and watched its pink brown body contract and expand as it moved incrementally across the pavement. Slowly it drew its body together. Slowly it pushed itself forward. Millimeter by millimeter it travelled, until it reached the grass. The slowly slowly it started to burrow, pushing its way into the dirt. I thought of so many things as I watched the little earthworm’s journey. Where did it come from? How did it know where it was going? What wonderful things was it doing for our earth? What persistence it must have!
And finally we walk the last stretch of the block and arrive home.
I look at my watch and we had been gone for almost an hour.
Sometimes the short walk takes just as long as the long walk.