TEMPERATURES around 40C day after day had me wistful and wondering. Wondering how as schoolchildren we thrived in this same heat when there were no air conditioners.
What’s more we’d hide our shoes on the way to school to do it bare-footed – folk dancing in the quadrangle and all. The soles of our feet must have been as tough as goat’s knees.
I’ve been wistful because of Doc and Wyatt and Boxing Day.
We spent Christmas with our family in 30cm of fresh snow in Colorado. Just remembering it seems cooling.
Doc and Wyatt gave us our first sleigh ride under a blue sky through a white blanket of serenity, silence, and breathtaking beauty.
They’re fine black, powerful horses named for Doc Holliday and Wyatt Earp.
Despite gliding across a Christmas card, bringing Sleigh Ride to life, one of our grandchildren was underwhelmed.
“I didn’t have a good time”, he said, “The sleigh didn’t fly”.
It was Christmas after all.
I’m reminded how often my own adult expectations set me up for disappointment.
On the other hand, like all small grandchildren, he is capable of profound wisdom. Leaving your family on the other side of the world is always painful.
The night before we travelled back to Perth, without a word he climbed on to his nanna’s lap, put his arms around her neck and stayed there a long time.
Author and lecturer Leo Buscaglia tells of another four-year-old doing the same thing to an elderly neighbour.
He had recently lost his wife, and the boy saw him crying. When he returned to his mother she asked him what he had said.
“Nothing”, the little boy replied, “I just helped him cry.”