It was the day after Christmas.
Whizz! A tiny two-year-old boy flew past Joe and me as we sat in the Detroit Metro Airport boarding area, awaiting our flight to Burlington, Vermont to visit our daughter and son-in-law. His mother grabbed him.
Zip! Another toddler dashed by, giggling. His twin! He’d almost vanished around the corner of the tunnel that led out to the absent plane when dad, running flat out, snatched him up.
Whoosh! Fifty feet away, another big-as-a-minute boy (a triplet!) scampered up an indoor ramp that descended to the carpet again after 60 feet. Dad pounced! And lastly, a yearling girl, pulling a tiny pink suitcase, had managed to slip underneath the ticket taker’s booth. Mom, on her knees, pulled her daughter out. Heavens! This was like trying to herd cats!
The boys, dressed in striped, footed ‘convict’ pajamas, continued to rocket about in random directions. This would be a fascinating flight. How on earth could they be kept together and settled? Both parents were slim: they had no time to eat. But here’s the thing. They smiled tiredly as they repeatedly retrieved each child.
Fifty minutes passed. Riveted, everyone abandoned books, computers and newspapers to watch endless random pursuits. When boarding began, laughter, and even applause, rippled through the area as the father expertly snared another toddler moving away at warp speed.
Aha! Those clever parents had had a plan all along. The kids, who had simulated rockets for over an hour, slept soundly during the flight. Their exhausted parents dozed, too. The energy they’d expended would have powered a small village for a day. Whew!
Vermont looked naked from the jet’s window. Denuded trees and no snow made a forlorn landscape. Parents and children deplaned first and disappeared into the crowd. Everyone wished them well.
We gaped at our minute rental car: a brand-new, tiny, shiny white Fiat. Hmmm. 6’2” Joe squeeeezed himself into the driver’s seat, while I eased into the passenger side. Our carry-on bags just fit into the boot. It drove smoothly, though, and had a fascinating hybrid gearshift arrangement. Our trusty GPS guided us three miles into Winooski (just across the river from Burlington) to The Woolen Mill, a lovely old brick warehouse converted to large, airy apartments situated right at the edge of the vigorous Winooski River.
The apartment’s huge windows looked out on its wide expanse. Directly below us mega-tons of water roared over the dam, and through open sluice gates! I rushed outside to view it more closely, and was stunned by the energy and power! An iron railing buried in granite just a few feet from the edge separated me from an ice-cold, pounding death. The ground shook: the sound was deafening!
Another kind of powerhouse zoomed through the apartment on velvet paws. Lightning-fast Junie Moon, their eight-month-old tortoise shell kitty, effortlessly demonstrated perfect balance as she leaped and bounded from here to there, and struck poses that yoga masters would envy. Though curious, she avoided our new hands.
But three days later, Junie, rocketing by, stopped suddenly. With sphinx-like deliberation she looked me over. Then, deciding, she hopped onto my lap, curled into a ball of black and Aztec gold, and slept, her nose in my palm, one claw-sheathed paw draped over my right arm. I felt honored.
She snoozed for 30 minutes before rising to languidly stretch. Onyx flecked golden eyes looked deeply into mine for a little stretch of time…. Then she shot off.
Here’s to hyperkinetic kids and kittens to jump-start the New Year!
Whizz! A tiny two-year-old boy flew past Joe and me as we sat in the Detroit Metro Airport boarding area, awaiting our flight to Burlington, Vermont to visit our daughter and son-in-law. His mother grabbed him.
Zip! Another toddler dashed by, giggling. His twin! He’d almost vanished around the corner of the tunnel that led out to the absent plane when dad, running flat out, snatched him up.
Whoosh! Fifty feet away, another big-as-a-minute boy (a triplet!) scampered up an indoor ramp that descended to the carpet again after 60 feet. Dad pounced! And lastly, a yearling girl, pulling a tiny pink suitcase, had managed to slip underneath the ticket taker’s booth. Mom, on her knees, pulled her daughter out. Heavens! This was like trying to herd cats!
The boys, dressed in striped, footed ‘convict’ pajamas, continued to rocket about in random directions. This would be a fascinating flight. How on earth could they be kept together and settled? Both parents were slim: they had no time to eat. But here’s the thing. They smiled tiredly as they repeatedly retrieved each child.
Fifty minutes passed. Riveted, everyone abandoned books, computers and newspapers to watch endless random pursuits. When boarding began, laughter, and even applause, rippled through the area as the father expertly snared another toddler moving away at warp speed.
Aha! Those clever parents had had a plan all along. The kids, who had simulated rockets for over an hour, slept soundly during the flight. Their exhausted parents dozed, too. The energy they’d expended would have powered a small village for a day. Whew!
Vermont looked naked from the jet’s window. Denuded trees and no snow made a forlorn landscape. Parents and children deplaned first and disappeared into the crowd. Everyone wished them well.
We gaped at our minute rental car: a brand-new, tiny, shiny white Fiat. Hmmm. 6’2” Joe squeeeezed himself into the driver’s seat, while I eased into the passenger side. Our carry-on bags just fit into the boot. It drove smoothly, though, and had a fascinating hybrid gearshift arrangement. Our trusty GPS guided us three miles into Winooski (just across the river from Burlington) to The Woolen Mill, a lovely old brick warehouse converted to large, airy apartments situated right at the edge of the vigorous Winooski River.
The apartment’s huge windows looked out on its wide expanse. Directly below us mega-tons of water roared over the dam, and through open sluice gates! I rushed outside to view it more closely, and was stunned by the energy and power! An iron railing buried in granite just a few feet from the edge separated me from an ice-cold, pounding death. The ground shook: the sound was deafening!
Another kind of powerhouse zoomed through the apartment on velvet paws. Lightning-fast Junie Moon, their eight-month-old tortoise shell kitty, effortlessly demonstrated perfect balance as she leaped and bounded from here to there, and struck poses that yoga masters would envy. Though curious, she avoided our new hands.
But three days later, Junie, rocketing by, stopped suddenly. With sphinx-like deliberation she looked me over. Then, deciding, she hopped onto my lap, curled into a ball of black and Aztec gold, and slept, her nose in my palm, one claw-sheathed paw draped over my right arm. I felt honored.
She snoozed for 30 minutes before rising to languidly stretch. Onyx flecked golden eyes looked deeply into mine for a little stretch of time…. Then she shot off.
Here’s to hyperkinetic kids and kittens to jump-start the New Year!