Mama-Son Dates

When Jeff works in the evenings, I've been trying to plan dates for Biscuit and me. Nothing fancy, just something to break up our routine.

One evening last week, I picked him up at day care, and we went to a nice playground at a nearby park. They had bucket swings for toddlers and a couple of small slides. The one drawback was that it had rained some that afternoon, so Biscuit's shoes picked up some mud and wet mulch. Plus, the swings and slides were a little wet.

Biscuit had on play clothes, so when I saw this pretty little girl in a fancy little outfit heading for the slides, I sent Biscuit down a couple of times to dry off the slide with his rear end. I figured I'd rather see a little dirt on his butt rather than on that little girl's pretty outfit.

The one weird thing at the park was that I don't really know the rules. I grew up in a small community where any available adult helped us or called us down or patched up our skinned knees. But how does that work in a city where you don't know the other kids or parents?

One little girl was sitting on a swing yelling for her daddy to come push her. She was less than 10 feet away from me, but I didn't dare go over to push her. I didn't know how her parents would respond. I really hate that it's like that. I love kids and wanted to talk to and play with all of them.

Of course, when I thought about it the other way, I don't think I would appreciate some stranger approaching or talking to Biscuit when I wasn't around.

On another date, Biscuit and I went by and got some takeout dinner then went to a pretty garden to eat at a picnic table. He wasn't tall enough to sit on the bench, so I set him on top of the table. He thought that was pretty cool.

After we ate, I thought he might enjoy walking around for a while. Everything was fine. He was pointing and saying, "flowers," "trees," "dogs," "duck," "baby" and "shoes" for everyone who passed.

But then, he saw a statue. A bronze statue of two people sitting on a fence. To say he didn't like the statue would be quite an understatement. He scotched his feet and wouldn't move another inch once he saw them. I tried to explain that they weren't real people, but he was having none of that. I finally had to pick him up and backtrack in the other direction to get around the statue. Unfortunately, there are several statues around the garden, so we had to avoid several areas.

After we had walked for a while, we found a bench along one of the sidewalks and sat down to people watch. And dog watch. And flower watch. And tree watch. And duck watch. And baby watch. And shoe watch. You get the idea.

Biscuit said "shoe" twice for each person who walked by. This was accompanied by him pointing at their feet. Then a lady came by and threw him off completely. She had taken her shoes off and was carrying them in her hand as she walked.

Biscuit looked at her feet, then looked at her hand, then looked at me. I think he was confused about why she would be carrying her shoes instead of wearing them. He pointed at her hand and said, "Shoes." Then he pointed at her feet and said, "Toes." Then he looked at me. Then he looked at the lady and repeated his pointing and saying "shoes" and "toes."

She just laughed and kept walking, but poor Biscuit just kept talking about it. I tried to explain to him that it was okay if she carried her shoes instead of wearing them. Luckily, a man with a dog came by and all shoes and toes were forgotten.

I've enjoyed this time with my boy. I hope we get to go on more dates soon.