October 26, 2001 - Friday
Harry's mother has been working more from home as Jeremy's arrival approaches and today we both went to get Harry from daycare. When we got there he immediately started telling us about his exciting walk to see a "big pile of dirt," a "little backhoe," and a "BIG backhoe." Local kids had a "professional day" off from school so Harry's friends from daycare were home all day. As a diversion for them all, I had suggested they might walk over to the construction site for the new school being built in town (certainly less than a half a mile away) and it became clear from Harry that she had gone with the idea.

On the way away from daycare, I purposely drove in the direction of that school construction project on the chance that Harry might want to see it again. Sure, enough he did and we drove around outside the area looking at the truly large pile of dirt and the various pieces of capital equipment. That only took a few minutes but it got me thinking about where else we might all go together before heading home. What I came up with was a piece of conservation land in town that features a large meadow with a pond at one end. The pond especially was a big hit with Harry as we spent several minutes throwing rocks and watching the splashes.

The worst part about having so much fun is that Harry doesn't want to stop. I've been working on the idea that having had fun is a good thing. "We had fun didn't we" is a phrase that I've often used leaving the playground or the library when it's time to go home and I used it again today. And, I think Harry is starting to understand the idea. He is at least repeating the words and has even started to use them himself in certain situations or while reminiscing. Of course, an even better way to help Harry stop doing something fun is to find something else and this time that was what Harry initially thought was another (not quite so big) pile of dirt. On closer inspection, it actually turned out to be a big pile of sh--, but that gave me a nice chance to explain to Harry that horses poop, too. As a special boon, on the way back to the car we came across some dog dung as well. Everybody poops. Harry had that studied look of concentration. We'll see if he goes with it.


Comments, opinions?