My grandson Dylan loves to put together jigsaw puzzles and not long ago I found this great site that has hundreds of them that are age-appropriate for him. He's become a real pro with click-and-drag and navigates back and forth and all over the place, picking and choosing puzzles. This morning he was doing bird puzzles and when he finished one of them he asked me to come over to the desk and look at it. I did. It was a little blue parakeet. I told him what it was and then I launched in to a story about how my family had owned one that looked very similar to the one on the puzzle back around the time I was the same age he is, which is 4. I told him its name was Tweetie Pie and how it could talk, how it would sometimes land on my father's chest in the morning and call out, "Wake up, Victor! Wake up, Victor!" Dylan asked me where it is now. Well, this little bird lived 52 years ago. I told him one day someone had left the door or window open and Tweetie Pie flew out and we never saw him again.
End of story.
I went and sat in the rocking chair with Cooper and he and I were peacefully watching "Cat in the Hat" when Dylan began to sob. Flat-out sob, like his heart was broken. Concerned, I hurried over to him and took him in my arms. "Dylan! What's the matter, sweetheart?" I asked. Thru his sobs he told me, "Gram, that story you told me about the little bird was the saddest story! What happened to that little bird?" This was five minutes or so after I'd told him the story! So I said to him, "Oh, honey...that little bird's in Birdie Heaven. He's ok. You don't need to worry about him!" Finally he began to calm down and, chastised, I went back to sit with Cooper. I never dreamt my story would affect him like that. He is so tender-hearted.
We're coming to the tail end of our beautiful Indian Summer weather we've been enjoying most of the month of October. Today was gorgeous so the boys and I set out to walk to Fred Meyer. We left at 9 am and didn't get home until noon. We stopped and admired every Halloween decoration along the two-mile walk to the store. Counted and flipped over every ancient horse-tether ring cemented in our old sidewalks...25 before they got distracted by some of those big puff-up balloon-style lawn decorations, a black cat, a witch, and several ghosts. As we were admiring those, along came two different people with dogs that needed to be petted and admired. We did our shopping and as we stopped just outside the doors so I could give the boys a cold drink before we set off for home in the double stroller I was approached by two young men. "Excuse me, ma'm," one of them said to me. I smiled at them and said, "Yes?" The one who'd spoken then asked, "Have you ever heard about a treasure hunt?" I thought on that for a moment. "You mean like geo-caching or something like that?" He smiled and said, "No. I'm talking about a treasure hunt where we're supposed to go searching for treasures. One item on our list says we're supposed to speak to someone pushing a stroller. May we talk to you for a moment?" I told them sure they could and the young man told me, "We're Christians and we're supposed to ask whoever will talk to us if they would like us to pray with them." I told them, "Well, I've been a Christian almost 34 years and I would love to have you pray with me." I think I almost knocked their socks off, ha! He asked me, "Do you have a particular burden or need you'd like to pray about?" and I told them something on my heart. Then we bowed our heads right there and that young man said the most beautiful prayer. And it literally felt like Heaven opened up and came down and blessed us right there. It was lovely. For me, and for them. When I told Dear Hubby about it this evening he said, "Maybe they were angels. Maybe that prayer protected you and the boys the rest of the day." Maybe so. I like to think so, anyway.
And then the boys and I set off for the long walk home. As I'm trudging along all of a sudden Dylan starts calling "Keepy!" at the top of his voice and Cooper chimes right in. "Keepy! Keepy!" I asked Dylan, "Who or what is Keepy?!" and he reached over and patted Cooper on the head and said, "Keepy is Cooper's daughter." "His daughter?" I asked, mystified. And Dylan told me very seriously, "Yes." "What happened to her?" I asked. He said, "She went to the beach with my daughter and granddaughters and got lost and we've been trying to find her. Gram, will you help us yell for her?" I thought that one over for a moment, shrugged, and started calling "Keepy! Keepy!" right along with them.
We never did find her.
