September 18, 2005 - Sunday
This little girl with the pulled-back hair, bangs, and the soccer ball is Hadley. She's in Harry's kindergarten class and her name started popping up a week or two ago. She's one of Harry's friends from class and, apparently, has been becoming one of Harry's best friend at school. Today's soccer game between Harry's orange team and Hadley's gray was the first time we saw and met her (although, we're the parents and "meeting" means little more than saying "hi" before they run off).

The dynamic between the two of them was fascinating, even (or perhaps especially) for all the stereotypes even at such a young age. They both rushed to be at the front of their respective team lines for shaking hands after the game, and there were several instances when they talked together during the game on the sidelines. But it was pretty clear from the interaction before and during the game that Hadley was doing more of the flirting and Harry more of the playing it cool. Actually, there were a lot of times when that "play it cool" actually seemed more like confusion or embarrassment, although at this age it's hard to know if Harry would have any idea what to be embarrassed or confused about..

I have no doubt having watched them interact that Hadley probably thinks of Harry as her boyfriend, at least in a charming five-year-old kind of way. Indeed, at one point when the little blonde girl on his team (behind eating a popcycle) started talking to Harry I saw Hadley face immediately turn into something of a cross between a dirty look and a pout. Hadley's mother, who happened to be Hadley's team couch, seemed to have heard about Harry beforehand, and from her mother's turn of phrase I might guess that Hadley had been talking about Harry a lot.

I'm really not entirely sure how to read Harry on all of this. He's talked about Hadley on an increasing basis over the last two weeks without much of a hint of self-consciousness, yet today he was very coy with her at times. Sometimes he was very excited by Hadley's presence and sometimes he purposefully seemed to try and ignore her altogether. This is new stuff for both of them, I guess, and even though they're just kids perhaps there's something instinctual telling them that this sort of friendship is different somehow, even if they have no idea why. Still, it's all so wonderfully innocent. And look at this: very coincidentally they're both number 5! Perhaps they're meant to be!


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