A walk with Willamina

The other day, Mina watched as her dad and two of her brothers walked our the front door. When they opened the door to go, she started flapping and saying, "side! side! side? side?" But when the door closed in her face, she just cried. Oh, she cried.

I got her shoes on her, grabbed myself an apple as a snack, and walked her out the front door. She walked down the driveway and stopped, looking around as if to say, "what now?"

I said, "Do you want to go to the playground?" She didn't speak, just turned and starting marching down the street in answer. I followed, reaching down and catching her hand. She held my finger as she walked.

When we got to the corner, I said, "No cars?" and we crossed together. Here was the first fork in our road. I turned her toward the left and said, "we go this way?" She said, "No. No way." and turned to the right and marched toward the playground.

After a few steps, she stopped, turned to me and held out her hand. She said, "Apple?"

I handed it to her. She strode on with the half-eaten thing in her first, munching at it every once in a while.

When we got to the playground, she walked over to the swings. I asked her if she wanted to swing. I picker her up to put her in the baby swing. "No!" I put her down and she wandered off again, biting at her apple core.

I sat down on one of the bigger swings. Then Mina bumped her head on the other swing and began to cry. I scooped her onto my lap and began swinging her with me. She stopped crying.

"Whee! Whee! Whee!" she said, exclaiming both forward and back as we went. Suddenly I noticed the exuberant chirping and singing of the birds in the nearby tree. "Do you hear the birdies singing, Mina? Birds! Chirp chirp chirp! Do you hear it?"

She didn't answer. We kept swinging. "Whee!" Soon the seeds of the apple came tumbling out of her mouth and onto her shirt. I brushed them off on to the ground and she stared down at the ground looking for them. Another minute passed and she looked up at me and said, "Birdie."

We got off the swing and I walked with her over to the slide. I sat down at the bottom of it and sat her down next to me. "No," she said, and wandered away, toward the street.

"Where do you think you are going?" She giggled in response. I caught up with her and grabbed her hand in time to cross the street with her. She stepped into the grassy area near our neighborhood's pool. After a few steps, she paused. Then commenced the game of giving me the apple core, stepping away, then coming back and taking the apple core back again. Repeat. And repeat. She took it back now, the last time, and broke it in two. Now another game: dropping one piece and picking it up again every few steps. Until she dropped it in a place where she couldn't retrieve it. She left it, consumed now in watching the teenagers at the poolside and the beach ball she thought she might be able to get to.

I don't know how long she would have stayed there, figuring how she could get that ball, if I hadn't coaxed her away, telling her we had to go home. I had to pick her up and carry her a few yards, and she complained a bit, but when I put her down, she led the way again, back toward our street. Back to home.

We walk back inside and Mina is seeking a drink of water. She gulps at it and is happy.