He started to crawl during Sandbox Season, when the sand spreads itself like a mist across my wood floor and the almond blossoms perfume the air and make the nose run. He started to crawl when the watering can needed to be reinstated and the snapdragons started to poke their blossomed brains out of their green necks.
One arm, and then another, and a wiggle of the knee and there he was, grabbing for the leaf that blew in with the Spring breeze. He stared at the leaf and carefully pinched it between his fingers. Then he tried to eat it.
I ran to save him.
He tasted it, his first bite of Spring.
People often say they're jealous of babies. I think they mean they wish they could sleep all day and have their food catered to them.
But perhaps they mean to say they wish to feel the thrill of it all; of existing again. To find a door and open it without a care for what may be on the other side.
My baby's a man on a mission and his mission is to open all doors. And all books. And all cupboards.
Sometimes he likes what he finds. Usually he's just happy to have opened and closed and opened and closed and opened and closed.
And opened.
And the whole world is sand and leaves, doors and cupboards, from one end of the rug to the other.
Me. Unedited. I had a feeling I was going to say something interesting eventually, so I was sitting on this one. Until I accidentally published it. Now I must go. It's mysteriously quiet and I can't see the baby.
