By Dan Barber
May 31, 2014 marks the first anniversary of my second
and final retirement. I think that my wife, Diane, has adjusted to me hanging
around the house all the time… at least she hasn’t kicked me out yet.
I spend a lot of time with my 3-year old grandson, Mason,
because he lives just across the street from me and it seems the two of us are
the only people around who have nothing special to do or places to go. My
daughter and wife figured that they could kill “two birds with one stone” by
sending us both to the park.
Mason and I have some very challenging conversations. His
latest quest is to try and find the answer to everything! His favorite question
is “why.” I realize that he is just trying to learn, and it is fun watching him
learn new things… for example he just learned a new phrase, probably from his
mother. He told me that his dog chewed up his box… I repeated the statement in
the form of a question… “Your dog chewed up your box?” He replied, “Didn’t I
just say that!”
Mason has been after me to teach him how to play baseball so
we borrowed his brother’s baseball bag with glove, helmet, baseballs and bat to
take to one of our frequent trips to Knott Sky Park, just down the street from
our house… this had to be done while his brother was in school. The first
lesson lasted probably 3 minutes because Mason has the attention span of a
3-year old. I will let his t-ball coach next year try to teach him the
fundamentals of baseball, if Mason can be torn away from filling up his ball
cap with dirt or trying to catch any number of lizards or insects he spots.
Watching little kids playing t-ball is fun especially as a grandparent who
isn’t embarrassed by the antics of a grandchild… because grandchildren are a
grand-parent’s revenge on their children.
When my granddaughter, Kaitlyn, played t-ball she felt that
it was her duty to play every position on the field at once… she would even try
to chase the ball after she hit it. She is now an accomplished fast-pitch
softball player who in fact can play every position on the field, but not all
at once.
Today marked a milestone in developing Mason into a swimmer.
I got him to put on his “muscles” (water-wings) and got him to trust me that he
wasn’t going to drown if he let go of my fingers. Luckily, he was pretending
that he was a puppy today so I explained to him that puppies know how to swim
automatically so all he had to do was kick his feet and paddle his arms like a
puppy would do to swim. He can now paddle around the pool without anyone
hanging on to him… next step will be to wean him away from his “muscles.”
Two more of our grandchildren will be visiting us for a
week, our paternal twin grandchildren Holly and Joshua will be arriving Sunday.
Those two are soccer players. I will be happy to take them to the park and set
in the shade while they run back and forth kicking the ball… grandpa is too old
for such activity.
In retirement I may have evolved into a big playmate for my
grandchildren, and the mind is always willing but the old body rebels against
such nonsense as trying to throw a fast pitch ball so a granddaughter can take
batting practice, or running at top speed after a 3-year old who finds it
hilarious that grandpa can’t catch him.
Diane says I take too many naps…
No comments:
Post a Comment