My daughter is now a confident four and a half year old who can probably do her own taxes and can definitely hop on one leg. But when she was a grub, and it was the pandemic, and we were trapped inside, we went on a hell of a lot of walks.
This is a list of eight descriptions I wrote.
Strutting like a pouchless kangaroo who has all the accessories, but doesn’t know how to hop.
Like guarding a delicate egg from absolutely nothing at all.
Eagerly awaiting the first passing stranger so that I might wave at them, my long lost lover whose identity I keep secret from God.
Imagining what life will be like when I am gone and she will have no one to push this little pram around.
Stashing peanut butter pretzels to feed the dogs.
Wrestling an electric fan into position, then wrestling it again, then turning it on, then watching as she flits her little eyelids, annoyed by the endless wind.
Stashing the fan in the basket (angrily).
Scavenging the roadside for bic lighters, presumably dropped by teenage weed-smokers in a hurry; I find them scattered in the grass like little plastic rainbow strips, no two colors the same.
Props to Nicolas Raymond for the baby stroller icon.