Port Colborne, Ontario

 

© Christine Mastroianni, all rights reserved                   

Children have no past and future. Thus they enjoy the present - which seldom happens to us.

- Jean De La Bruyere

I know it isn't summertime and I am therefore clashing with the season by posting this pic, but I am sure most of you viewing this are okay with being momentarily transported to warmer, lazier days. (Pause to feel the sultry sun caressing your cheeks.........)  I happen to love winter, and am also content with being on the brink of spring, so I'm not desperately longing for the mugginess of summer. I think in all honesty I was just in the mood to post a sweet picture of feet!

It was a lazy Sunday afternoon and we were visiting the stunning botanical creation of a photographer friend of mine - the perfect summer destination for my two curious little men. They were enthralled by the flurry of minute pond creatures that must have been skimming right over their submerged fingers..... seeking out darting damselflies as they teasingly hovered over the aquatic vegetation. I love how children can truly enjoy the moment in which they are currently breathing... they care not about what time it is, fuss not about getting dirty, worry not about whether there are spiders potentially lurking between the planks below them. (All things that I would probably be contemplating were I in this position!!!)

When I look at this picture, I remember a relaxing afternoon spent beneath a gazebo, kicking back and catching up with my good friend.. it was just a great day! The weather was wonderfully warm, not too humid or breezy, and I was revelling in the notion that this was the only real requirement of my day. I was quite conscious of this fact: treating it as a fleeting escape from all of my responsibilities. The simple fact of being removed from my own domesticated environment meant that I was physically unable to combine pairs of sports socks or remove lunchtime's spaghetti sauce from my dishes...I could just sit and breathe and talk. And enjoy it.

But my kids weren't revelling or relaxing or thinking about any of these things at all.  They were lying at the water, smiling as minute pond creatures skimmed over their submerged fingers, seeking out darting damselflies as they hovered over the vegetation.