May 5th - the day of Smiley's First Holy Communion, was a grand day of many adventures. The others will be detailed in good time, but the final fling of the day was a stop in the park behind Pulaski High School, where we ate some Taco Bell and had the kids unwind by running around on the grass. I casually mentioned a railroad bridge nearby that I used to cross everyday walking to school. The kids wanted to see it, so what the heck - I took them across and down the tracks.
To my knowledge, the bridge is no longer in use (I noticed the line was blocked off with gravel at the start of it, presumably by someone official-like), but the line that 'T''s with it is active. On the second trip over the bridge Smiley and Junie ran ahead and we heard a train blow its whistle. Now, let it be known that from MY vantage point I could see the train was headed down the track but if you were taking a photograph from where LuLu and YaYa were standing it looked like that train was a'barrelling down the bridge and right at the lil' ones who had nowhere to go.
YaYa and LuLu screamed and screamed until the train went past, then ran to gather up their siblings. They (the older two) were clearly traumatized, while the little kids seemed perplexed by the attention. While it was terrifying for both of my oldest two, the incident made me fee warm inside - when push came to shove, they love their siblings and hated the idea of them being hurt.
We may take that walk again, and soon, because the kids have expressed an interest in taking the tracks all the way to the road by our house (several miles) and to quote Lisa "they don't get as much excitement as I did as a kid. If you're with them, and its safe, I think it would be good for them."
What a great Communion day Smiley had!
1 comment:
A lot of the adventure and excitement from everyday life is wrung out of the experience, because we let the urge to keep them safe overpower common sense.
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