July 2, 2001 - Monday
I took Harry back to the playground this afternoon for the first time since his leg injury. I was anxious to see whether he remembered this place fondly or if there would be some hesitancy as his young mind worked through the memories of discomfort. In hindsight, I'm not sure I really have a solid answer. Sure, Harry seemed quite happy to be there, though didn't squeal as much as before on our arrival. And, the first thing he did when I set him loose was to climb up the steps to the very slide he was hurt on. Down we went (this time I held both of his legs). But, in order to get to that slide Harry had to directly bypass another smaller slide that had previously been a favorite for solo sliding. And, when I brought him back to that smaller slide and placed in at the top, he initially declined to go down. I even had to pull a little and spot him down the first time. After that he seemed to do all right, but it makes me wonder whether that fear of injury was rattling around in his young brain.

Naturally, Harry did not want to leave the playground and even sat down limply in classic whining toddler fashion if I tried to pick him up. However, I had already decided to try the method that seemed to work so well with the backhoe: giving him plenty of warning. So, I told him we needed to go home.
"No, " he said.
"Didn't you want to go home and have dinner?"
"No."
I wanted a while. "I think we need to go home, Harry."
"No."
"You can on the slide one more time before we go home."
"No."

After about ten minutes of warnings, Harry, for whatever reason, made his way to a piece of apparatus at the edge of the playground. Then, as he started to move away I grabbed his two hands and began to swing-hop him along in the direction of the car. This is a funny little game and he laughed at first, not unexpectedly. But, he continued to laugh all the way to the car and as I put him in his car seat, he only began to call for the water bottle in the cup holder. Wow, not bad!


Comments, opinions?