Prompt

Abe is prompt. He can’t bear arriving in an untimely manner and has been known to head off walking to church without us or biking to his grandparents’ house to be on time for a dinner that the rest of us will be late for.

And what could possibly make anyone feel emotional about that, I ask you?

Nothing. Absolutely nothing.

Only, . . . the other day (when I saw him walking through the empty parking lot across the street from us – headed to his first baseball game of the season – water bottle held in his mitt, red cap on his head, socks pulled up tight to meet his baseball pants, and a good 15 minutes to spare before I guessed the coach or any of the other players might possibly be there) I got a little lump in my throat.

He seemed so small heading off in his determined and timely manner to meet whatever might be awaiting him (which . . . in this case . . . was . . . well . . . like I said: a pleasant little baseball game, but . . . you know . . . it might have been anything; anything in the whole world; and there he was – resolutely heading off to meet it . . . and with no intention of keeping it waiting either. Not for a second).

No need to rush, Abe. There’s still plenty of time. Plenty of time for everything. It’s OK if we keep some of it waiting a bit. . . . Isn’t it?



Mike took Daisy to a piano recital that night while I made my way over to the game with the younger kids. Goldie spent most of her time on the playground or scouting out various shady spots, but here are the little folks who, when they weren’t wailing in agony because I had failed to bring them water bottles when it was so hang-your-shoulders-and-moan-and-cry hot, were watching the game (and, in the case of Jesse, heckling the players a bit):

(I know, Anders. That was a shockingly close out. I really couldn’t believe it either.)