Fall Back, Crying

We arrived early for babysitting duty yesterday, which meant I was there for my grandson’s arrival home from preschool. “I want to play sports,” were the first words out of his mouth before he even walked through the front door. When Clare noted the lack of sunlight necessary for throwing, hitting, and catching, Leo responded with a flood of tears. Welcome to standard time, my boy. Figuring this might happen, I cleared a plan of action, for the two of us to have the back room to ourselves; you don’t want to hit a six-week old sister/granddaughter with one of those palm-sized footballs. Maeve stayed with Michele in the living room while the boys worked their mischief in back. It was about 45 minutes of mayhem, grandson standing two feet away from Grandpa to throw a ball and the old man fearing for his sight if not his life. When I threw the ball, he mostly caught it and then ran for a touchdown. Unlike other times, there was no “Touchdown, Packers!” shouted on crossing the imaginary goal line. Eventually, the football gave way to a book on Thomas the Tank Engine, and, by bedtime, we were that much closer to a return of daylight savings time.