(Written a while ago, forgot to finish, publish too)
When I got home yesterday, upon entering my house, I was stunned to smell a strong gasoline odor. I asked Karyn what happened, and found out that she had mowed the lawn and that the mower leaks gas. Confused, I wondered why she would have the mower in the house. She was busy doing tasks walking from here to there and I prodded to figure why the smell was so strong in the house. She said that the mower is in the garage and that she just opened the door to get clothes from the dryer not long ago. I am guessing that she had gotten acclamated to the odor, because she did not seem bothered by it. I suggested that I take the kids outside for a while until the odor dissipated.
She agreed, and I went through the house opening windows and doors, switching our air conditioner from recirculate to ventilate. Within a minute, the atmosphere had been refreshed. The kids were all excited to go for a walk though, so I grabbed my camera and phone and walked with the kids outside.
We were going to walk just around the block, so I wanted the kids to hold each other’s hands while I led them and took a few photos. Josiah, understanding my intent, arranged Noah and Zion with himself to stand in order by height for a posed group shot in front of our van in the driveway.
They walked down the sidewalk precariously strolling, Noah and Zion veering often away from the concrete into the decorative rock landscaping and stumbling, frustrating me a bit, knowing that there would be tears when they fell. I prefer to avoid the tear management problem altogether, if possible. We stopped in front of a field of foxtails, which are a novelty to Josiah, and consequently, Noah, and to a lesser extent, Zion. They plucked a few of them and before boredom was unanimous, we continued on.
Next we saw a curious tree stump, with stakes holding caution/cuidado tape around the sight. I wondered what the warning was about, since I hadn’t thought of a tree stump being where a tree had been for years as something to catch a passerby by dangerous surprise.
After a bit more walking we saw a hydrant. I asked Noah if he knew what it was; he didn’t know. Same question to Josiah, and he was at a loss for the name of it but wanted to assure me that it’s purpose was explainable. “that’s where the firemen put their hose onto to put water on fires” he explained. Not to bypass Zion, I asked her if she knew what it was, and she did not know.
I thought the hydrant looked cool, and I always like my kids in a picture, since a still inanimate life image does not have the lasting value of any image featuring people, and my kids are great examples of people loved and almost always avialable to me.
(lost interest in finishing this, so short ending below:)
…I finished walking around the block and took a few pictures. See my images on Flickr. I am user “ezravision”