What *Is* It About Outside!?!

I suppose there are little kids who don’t like to go outside. Most of the ones I know (or knew when they were little), very much do like to go outside. Or, sometimes they look out the window and just think they want to go outside. When they do get out there and it’s 105° or 25°, they want to come right back in. (Of course, the problem is that no parent or responsible caregiver is going to let them go out when it’s 105° or 25° so the kids keep on standing by the door wailing at the injustice of it all. And the parents/caregivers are pretty much wailing on the inside…at the injustice of it all.)

Once, when Peter was a baby and I was taking care of him when Kevin and April were away, he was a little crabby one afternoon. Well, quite a bit crabby. I had rocked him and walked with him and tried to read a book to him, and sang to him, and nothing was working. He continued to cry, forlornly, abjectly, pathetically. So I opened the door and went out to the front porch and sat down in a chair. He wept and wept. Then, a little bit of breeze wafted by and brushed his sweet, damp, little baby face. He stopped, in the middle of a wail, and his eyes flew open. “Ollie, Mollie, Gollie!” he seemed to be thinking. “I’M OUTSIDE!!!” And that was that. We spent the next hour or so, contentedly, on the porch, watching the leaves blow in the breeze and the cars and trucks driving by on the street.

Hello, Baby in the Mirror

Last week, for three days, I kept some friends’ baby. He’s two and and a half months old and pretty calm and laid back. For example, his changing area is in the bathroom, where there are the most interesting lights on the wall above the mirror (You know, that regular row of lights above the mirrors in lots of bathrooms). When I took him in for a diaper change, we’d end up staying in there (and I am not exaggerating this) for 10 or 15 minutes, while he cooed and talked to the lights. And then, when he got a little weary of that, I could sit him up and hold him, for another 10 minutes or so, while he laughed at and chatted with his little friend, Baby in the Mirror. Seeeeeriously laid back baby.

But one afternoon, I thought a change might be nice, and I carried him out to his front porch. Oh, yes. Just enough breeze to move the leaves and make nice shadows from the warm sunshine. Very nice afternoon. I thought I’d bring his little bouncy seat outside and stay awhile, so, with him still in my arms, I turned around and opened the door and stepped back inside to get it. The instant we stepped back into the house, he opened his mouth and cried. Big time. No, no! Not back inside! I want OUTSIDE! We went back out.

Maybe this is how babies feel when they go outside. They sense nature erupting with the joy of the Lord; they hear the sounds of the mountains and hills and the applause of the trees. Who wouldn’t want to be part of that.

***Meanwhile, speaking of outside. Last Sunday morning, I checked the temperature here in Waco to see what kinds of jackets Peter and I might need to wear to church. While I was in the Weather App, I looked at New York. I showed Peter the temperature in Brooklyn. Then we looked at the information display on my fridge. In my freezer, the temperature was 5°. In Brooklyn, the temperature was 3°. “If Uncle Jeremy and Aunt Sarah had some ice cream, they could keep it in their back yard, where it’s colder than my freezer.” Brrrrr. We tried to call them, but they didn’t answer, so we left a message. “Maybe they’re on their way to church,” I said. We did get a message from Jeremy later, and yes, they had been on their way to church. The amazing thing to me is that they have the clothing to be able to walk one long block (one long block is about the same as three regular blocks) to their subway station and then, when they get off the train, three more long blocks AND three short blocks to get to church. Double and triple Brrrr.****