We visited Conner Prairie recently – it is one of our favorite “regular” stops. While you’ve been there many times as a baby though, this last time marked your first visit as a toddler – able to walk around yourself and wonder anew at the world in front of you. I watched you brush the sheep, pet the rooster, lug your little wheelbarrow around the beautiful gardens. I also watched you somehow manage to pass all of the animals that towered above you – you weaving in and out of the barnyard – to get to the milking machines in the back. Even though Soren and I had visited that same barn countless times in the last few years, we had failed to even notice them. You were fascinated with the knobs and buttons. You were enamored with the tubing. I could see your own wheels turning and my heart came alive watching you.
You’ve been enthralled with your little wooden trains lately. We hadn’t pulled them out in awhile, but a few weeks ago, out they came. It was as if a visible light bulb illuminated atop your head. You’ve found every surface in this home available for highway-dom. You’ve put tracks together; you’ve linked the magnetic train cars; you’ve giggled when the cars have fallen off of the tracks; and, after your own careful fashioning, you’ve even delighted at the consequent destruction of the track. B.O.Y. Again, my heart has come alive a little more watching you understand the world in a new way.
You are captivated with a wheel, a rock thrown off of a platform, buckles and gadgets. I sit and dream about you – maybe you’ll be an architect, an engineer, a designer. And then I am reminded – you already are, I'm your first client. You’ve built a bridge for me back to my own childhood joys, you’ve wired my mind and heart to alert itself towards creativity ag
ain, and you’ve artfully constructed new joys and heartstrings on which you daily tug.
