Wingless Fairies and Drunken Englishmen
14 Nov 2011 12 Comments
Athena snapped a shot of her beloved but now empty swimming pool.
Athena and I watched the draining of the swimming pool in our apartment complex, more poetically referred to as a “Garden” by the Chinese, at the end of September. This ended our nightly swims, much to Athena’s chagrin and my ill-concealed relief. When we walk to our Metro station, Xiangmihu, we cut through the courtyard in our Garden, and Athena always trots up the steps to the gate of the pool to check on the water level, or lack thereof. There is something a little disconcerting about seeing this gaping, unnaturally blue chasm sitting there. Swimming pools full of water are creepy enough: the eery reflections of lamplight, the uncomfortable feeling of wearing a swimsuit in public, and that unshakeable childhood fear of there being a resident shark. Yesterday afternoon we saw some boys skateboarding in it.
Two weeks ago I was told that Athena was supposed to start wearing her kindergarten’s winter uniform, despite the temperature’s disinclination to dip much below 80 degrees. I dutifully stuff her into her long-sleeved blue shirt, and black pants with blue accents on Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays, and her long-sleeved pink shirt on Tuesdays and Thursdays. I was expecting some protest from her, but Athena has acclimated to the tropics and the the odd phenomenon of humans imposing the seasons of a temperate climate where there are none. I am inclined to think that this comes of Shenzhen being a newer city. Millions of people have not been living here since the dawn of time. In fact, the city has only really taken off in the past few decades, and all of the people who have moved here have brought their seasonal wardrobe changes with them. It is now very much autumn in the estimation of Shenzhen’s population and Athena, making it difficult to prevent her from wearing tights and sweaters when we go out. I am afraid she’ll overheat. My arguments against sweaters and tights are weakened by no longer being able to use, “Look outside, nobody else is wearing sweaters and tights.”
The temperature has almost caught up to the people’s wardrobe now. Almost. Really, we are in jeans-and-t-shirt-with-the-occasional-hoody temperature bracket, which makes the babies dressed for winter in Siberia and women wearing fur stoles still a tad ridiculous. The Culture Club occupies one of the storefronts in our building. It is a place for people to come and practice their English, and listen to music that was at the height of its popularity while I was in 6th grade. There is an Englishman at The Culture Club with a Tsingtao beer permanently attached to his hand. He gave me a rundown of what to expect weatherwise while swaying slightly in his chair and wafting the scent of all of the other Tsingtao beers that have resided in his fist over the past however long he’s been living in Shenzhen. It’ll be in the mid 60s and low 70s until January, when it’ll dip down to something that actually passes for cold for a couple of weeks. “If you’re from Seattle, you’ll have no trouble,” he hiccuped. Then the Drunken Englishman fixed his gaze to a point just above my left shoulder and turned the conversation to the issue of health insurance. “If you don’t have some, you really ought to get some,” he took another swig, “this guy didn’t have any and he got meningitis and two days later, well, he’s dead.” I nod seriously and say that I have to go pick my daughter up from kindergarten, and begin walking towards the pedestrian overpass, thinking to myself that it was the meningitis that killed the man, not the lack of health insurance. As I walk over the flow of traffic on Hongli Road, I find that I am touching my chin to my chest to prove to myself that I am not, in fact, showing symptoms of meningitis, and wonder about the Drunken Englishman’s credibility when it comes to predicting the weather.
A fleeting glimpse of my wingless purple fairy.
Athena dressed up as a wingless purple fairy for my school’s Halloween party two weeks ago Thursday. We had gone to Wal-Mart and bought pink fairy wings and what turned out to be very thick and oily face paint Wednesday night. Evidently it was in vain, however, as Athena refused to wear the wings and after looking at my handiwork with the face paint on her face, asked me to wash it off. She spent most of the party running manic loops around the parade ground. The thick oily face paint has now been painted across the set of drawers we keep Athena’s clothes in and all over the wardrobe I keep my clothes in. Athena has been going on these incredible mess-making rampages on Saturdays while the Amazing Ayi is staying with her. This means that I don’t see the full extent of the messes, as they’ve mostly been cleaned up by the time I get home, but instead get a rundown of the havoc that has been wreaked in my absence. “She,” the Amazing Ayi sputters while pointing at markers, or face paint, or boxes of cereal, and making frantic scribbling, painting and dumping motions, “she, she.” After the Amazing Ayi departs, Athena and I go on a walkthrough of the apartment. Athena points out all of the damage she has done, and I ask her why she felt so compelled. She is contrite as she tells me that she “just likes making messes.” At least she’s honest.
I much prefer this mess-making to the cereal box emptying variety.
Mailbox Magic
03 Nov 2011 4 Comments
 Our building is the round one. Today, on my way back from a sanity-restoring trip to our local Starbucks, I stopped in the lobby of my building and opened my mailbox. As I fitted the key into the lock, turned it, opened the little metal door, and took out the junk mail that was lying in wait there, a joie de vivre washed over me. Only a week ago, I could only retrieve mail by snaking my hand into the box through the uncomfortably small gap between the door and the top of the box, pressing the mail against the IKEA catalogue that defied removal, and slowly sliding it towards the door. Then I would painstakingly slip a finger under the edge of one or two envelopes at a time and work it out through the gap. I was unable to do any of this prior to the delivery of the IKEA catalogue. On our first night in Shenzhen, the woman at my school who is (rather reluctantly) in charge of helping us manage daily life in China showed Athena and I into our one bedroom apartment, gave me the key to the exterior metal door of my apartment and a key card for the building. She admonished me to not lose the key, turned on the air conditioner and left us to our own devices. I quickly discovered my inability to access my mailbox, and started asking her for the key. After more than two months of asking after the key, she finally contacted my landlord, who helpfully suggested I get the lock on the mailbox changed as he didn’t have a key for it either. Just before the seven-day National Day break, Athena and I hired the Amazing Ayi (ayi means “auntie”). She works for another family at the school, and had time in her schedule to fit in taking care of Athena on Saturday mornings. When she arrived at my apartment on that first Saturday, things were an absolute mess. As any of you who have ever stepped into a room I’ve inhabited for longer than a day, or a car I’ve been driving for more than 4 or 5 hours knows, my ability to keep anything clean is pretty much nonexistent. There should have been the sound of heavenly arpeggios being strummed on a harp after she entered the apartment. Within a matter of minutes, the dishes were clean, the bed was made, and the laundry was started. This was all before I managed to make it out the door to work. The woman is a miracle worker. She is about my age, very intent on improving her English, and determined that I will learn Chinese. While I am only improving in comprehension, her speaking and comprehension seem to improve in leaps and bounds; her efforts to learn English and teach me Chinese facilitate our communication nicely. When faced with the problem of having the lock on my mailbox changed— “Maybe you can ask the guards at your building,” the woman from the school nonchalantly suggested before quickly disappearing out the open door of the International Section office—I decided that the Amazing Ayi was my best bet. The guards are legion in China, manning various booths and desks in pretty much every apartment complex, school, department store, etc., and sporting spiffy police-like uniforms and red armbands emblazoned with bright yellow characters asserting their authority. The Amazing Ayi spoke with the one of the guards at my building’s front entrance, and then called around to some locksmiths, gleefully haggling with people. It turned out that my building has a deal with a locksmith, and I was able to hire him, with the Amazing Ayi’s assistance, for a fraction of the price of the rest of the locksmiths. Of course, one is only able to find out about the existence of this competitively priced locksmith if one pesters the guards for a few days running, as I believe the Amazing Ayi did. The locksmith put on a grand performance in the same vein as the watch repairman, and the hair stylist. There were two guards on duty when he showed up, and they both abandoned their post at the front door to smoke and watch the locksmith artfully pop the old lock out of my mailbox and install the new one. One of the guards, who is rather toad-like in physique but very friendly in disposition, ran an appreciative hand over the removed lock, and made impressed noises at the quick work that was made of the job. I made appreciative noises, handed over what amounted to a little over $2 US, and cleaned out about 9 months of mail from my now accessible mailbox. I guess the key has been missing for quite some time. |
NaNoWriMo
25 Oct 2011 Leave a Comment
 National Novel Writing Month, or NaNoWriMo, is nearly upon us. Every November, thousands of people who have been bitten by the creative bug hunker down at their computers, typewriters, notepads, rolls of parchment, and papyrus scrolls, to pound out 50,000 word flights of literary fancy. WriMos, as we are frequently referred to, sign up for NaNoWriMo at http://nanowrimo.org, and find hours of fun procrastination in the forums and chat rooms there, as well as a place to verify our word counts and, come November 30, win. The goal is to produce 50,0000 words, roughly 175 pages of your own original novel. When your word count is verified at or above 50,0000, you win. If you think that 50,000 words couldn’t possibly be long enough to be a novel, think of Hitch Hiker’s Guide to the Galaxy, or Fight Club, and think again. The month acts as a sort of creative kick in the pants, and can help one develop, what is commonly referred to as “The Writing Habit.” It is not a writing competition in the traditional sense, nobody reads what you produce, and there is no second place. I did NaNoWriMo last November, and had a great time producing a tragedy of a first draft, which is still haunting my computer. I get it out and hack at it every once in a while for grins. Well, I had such a good time with it last year, that I’ve decided to do it again this year. The Office of Letters and Light, which puts on NaNoWriMo, also puts on Script Frenzy in April, during which, you guessed it, participants write a script in the month of April, and two Camp NaNoWriMos during the summer. NaNoWriMo was kicked off in 1999, and has continued to grow over the past decade and a bit. They have write-ins in many cities around the world that are organized by Municipal Liasons and allow WriMos the opportunity to meet equally crazy people and write together. The Office of Letters and Light also provides materials for creative writing classes and workshops in schools and libraries across the US. And they have a young writers program that encourages teens to funnel their angst into poetry and prose instead of into empty vodka bottles. All in all, I think it is a stand-up organization, and I would like to do my part to support it. Or rather, I’d like you all to do my part to support it. WriMos can set up sponsorship pages for their month of literary abandon, which is exactly what I’ve done. If you’d like to help support NaNoWriMo, and encourage me in my novel writing efforts, please visit http://www.stayclassy.org/fundraise?fcid=128997, and break out the plastic. Or, perhaps you’d like to join me in the literary fit of November. If you’ve had a novel idea kicking around in your head for awhile, even if you haven’t and just think it sounds like fun, I encourage you to sign up and, come November 1st, start writing! |
Writing Assignments and Watch Repair
24 Oct 2011 2 Comments
Every week I come up with two overly ambitious writing projects to subject my students to, one for my second graders, and one for my third graders. This week I had my second graders write their own stories, and my third graders write their own journal entries. The concept of writing your own story was relatively easy to communicate, and I had a few students get pretty into it. Vinson wrote about a monkey trying to take the moon out of the sky, only to discover that he was fishing around in a well. And Tommy wrote about a cat and a dog who were not friends. The last illustration of his story showed the cat’s tail protruding from the dog’s mouth, and he ended the story with a zinger of a last sentence: “Dog eat cat.”
The journal entry project was a bit stickier. It took about half an hour to explain it well enough that not all of my students’ eyes were glazed over. We read two examples from the textbook, and I showed them my journal and explained that I write an entry in it every night, telling what happened to me that day. After I saw the lightbulb of understanding go off for a few students, I prowled amongst the rows trying to get them to put pen to paper. Sometime it’s hard to tell whether my students aren’t doing the assignment because they honestly haven’t understood a word coming out of my mouth, or because they are simply resisting doing any more written work. Jessica got rather excited when she glommed onto the meaning of “You can write about anything,” and wrote about two boys who had been fighting in her class that day. I got rather excited when she turned to her classmate to ask what “ma” means in English. “Ma” is the syllable that is used in every Chinese textbook I’ve encountered thus far to demonstrate the importance of the four tones in determining meaning in Chinese, so I knew that it could mean “mother,” “hemp,” “horse,” or “to scold.” Given the context of the girl’s journal entry, I knew it had to mean “to scold.” I was devilishly pleased with myself as I spelled it out for her.
Athena's rockstar hairdo.
While I was trying to extract journal entries from 3rd graders, Athena had another dance performance at school. I hope that I get to see at least one of her performances while we’re here. I picked her up on Friday and found her hair done up in two fluffy, teased out buns. Her eyelids glittered with stage makeup, and her eyes glittered with excitement as a description of the “big yellow thing” that she had worn for the show bubbled out of her.
My watch stopped at the beginning of this week. I left its poor, silent, motionless body in the apartment and relied on my phone for the time. My wrist felt naked, and I found myself glancing down at it frequently to check the time, only to read the engraved message on my bracelet, live in the moment. By Wednesday I couldn’t shake the feeling that my bracelet was mocking me. Yesterday, finally having enough time to embark on getting the watch fixed, Athena and I set out for the little watch repair booth I’d noticed on the way to this labyrinthine market that Athena loves. I think in her mind this market represents the mothership of all thrift stores, and she loves pawing through the large stacks of clothes and whatnot. The whole place feels like it’s fallen off the back of a truck to me.
Athena was fascinated by the watch battery replacement process. The watch repairman sat in a booth behind a window, jeweler’s loupe screwed firmly to his eye. There was one man getting his watch repaired, and a large group of people standing around watching the repairman work. There always seem to be large groups of people gathered around to watch people work, which results in the work becoming a kind of performance. When he was done with the man’s watch, the repairman held his hand out through a slit in the window to take my watch. His movements were full of grace and precision, but he was still able to make each step of the process into a big production: taking the back off of the watch, fishing the battery out, putting a new one in, putting the back on again. It was like a dance. He handed me the bill, I handed him the money, he handed me the watch. I strapped it onto my wrist and immediately felt like a whole person again.
Chihuahua Lady and the Pipe Dream Team
16 Oct 2011 2 Comments
 Quick-Trick Block Stack On my way to pick Athena up from school the other day, I saw an old, haggard looking woman walking towards me. She had her hair cut short, and was wearing black pants and a scowl. Her shirt was bright pink, and had SEXY written across the front of it in a fancy script. I love these little gifts. And, these little gifts abound. One of my favorites so far was the old man at the MixC in a shirt that said PIPE DREAM TEAM. Chihuahua Lady was at the playground last Sunday evening. Athena and I usually see Chihuahua Lady walking on the street that runs between the apartment complex and my school. She has a herd of three or four chihuahuas that she shepherds with a short stick. Chihuahua Lady favors a pair of bright red heels, and coos to her dogs incessantly. At the playground she was sending one of her chihuahuas down the twisty slide to the great amusement of the two women who had accompanied her and her pack. There was more cooing, and a lot of ribald laughter. Athena and I had gone to Walmart for the first time in ages earlier in the day, and had returned with imported Japanese popsicles, a tub of building blocks, and a pair of ridiculous dress-up shoes, the kind your mom never allowed you to buy (cheap, ill-fitting, pink, high-heeled plastic affairs that evidently, life could not go on without). Athena insisted on wearing the shoes to the playground, despite slipping to the floor twice while trying to get out the door. Once we were at the playground, the shoes came off, simultaneously saving Athena’s neck, and encrusting her feet with a thick layer of grime. Chihuahua Lady and her friends found Athena’s shoes to be riotously funny, speaking to me in rapid fire Mandarin punctuated with peals of laughter. On Thursday night, Athena and I went with Becca, Marat, and Baby Alec to Coco Park for dinner and grocery shopping. Coco Park is one stop away on the Metro. Athena likes to ride in the very last car of the subway. When it doesn’t make me too motion sick, I like it too. It is generally less crowded than the middle of the train, which is close to the escalators and stairs and elevator, and you can see the tunnel streaking by on either side of the train, the whole train laid out in front of you, the long aisle curving as it snakes around an easy bend in the track. When you stand at the front of the train, also typically less crowded, and lean against the partition between the operator and the seething masses, you can hear this very satisfying kerclunk as what one imagines to be a lever is pulled into a locked position. The kerclunk sounds, and a few beats later the train lurches forward. I get this giddy feeling every time I hear the kerclunk. At dinner, Athena, addressing the table while standing on her chair robustly declared, “I am SO hungry!” Marat looked up at her, “So hungry you could eat an elephant?” Athena pondered this for a minute, and, sitting down, quietly replied, “If you killed it first.”
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Splendid China, Splendid Indeed
07 Oct 2011 5 Comments
Athena took this on our way to the ticket window.
Just a few more steps to fall down....
Athena, still manning the camera, captured the dragon snaking its way into Splendid China.
Still in the midst of the 7-day National Day holiday, Athena and I rolled out of bed Tuesday morning, packed up the pink Walmart stroller and headed for the Metro station. We got off at the stop for Overseas Chinese Town and followed the signs pointing us to the exit from the subterranean station leading to the gates of Splendid China. The sky was overcast, and the crowds were manageable. We bought my ticket (Athena was free, as determined, once again, by height) and headed into the park. Splendid China is yet another theme park in Shenzhen. It is divided into two parts, one containing a series of folk villages that represent a selection of the ethnic groups of China, the other a formal garden with miniatures of all of the sights worth visiting in China such as the Great Wall, the Terracotta Warriors, and the Summer Palace, to name a few.
Athena and I reveled in the fact that we had come on our own and were therefore free to mosey at our own pace from food stall to dance show to food stall. The first show we happened upon was at the Uygar house, which was just across a courtyard from Tibet. We sat on a wooden bench and ate watermelon while we waited for the show to begin.
Athena and her tasty cup-o-watermelon.
Other merrymaking families trickled into the seating area, and, noticing us, got really excited and pulled out their cameras. One family in particular had three generations in attendance, and each generation posed with us for a picture. I entered into the spirit of it, putting bunny ears on whoever happened to be snuggled up next to me.
A sample of the pictures I took of the family that kept posing with us for pictures.
Athena, happy with her watermelon, saved getting really upset by having her picture taken for a little later in the day, and even managed a few juicy smiles. After they had taken what I hoped was their last picture, I hauled out my camera and started taking pictures of them. It seemed like the thing to do.
Uygar dancing.
Athena sat on my shoulders and took pictures of the Tibetan dancing.
After the dance performance, Athena sprinted for the Tibetan Buddhist temple that was in the Tibetan village. It was surprising to me how enthralled by it she was. She stood staring at the various statues for a long time, asking who they were. I couldn’t give very satisfactory answers, knowing next to nothing about Tibetan Buddhism and finding the informational signs less than informational (aside from lacking anything remotely informative, the English signs were also missing a lot of letters, which made them difficult to decipher). We watched part of a Tibetan dance performance, and then trundled off to another ethnic group.
YURTS!!!
The only thing that I was determined to see at Splendid China was the Mongolian horse show at 2:30, in the “Horse Battle Arena.” I also wanted to get on a horse, if at all possible. So, after touring through most of the villages, taking in the thatched huts, waterwheels, traditional weaving looms and the like, Athena and I made our way to the yurts.
HORSES!!!
The Mongolian settlement, had a very rustic air about it, and enough people of Mongolian descent (probably of Inner-Mongolian extraction) to create perhaps the most authentic atmosphere in the park. I had had some experience with things Mongolian as a teenager when I travelled with my aunt and uncle to visit a cousin in China. We ended up traveling with a Mongolian woman to Inner Mongolia and spending a couple of days on a commune there (as we were with a Mongolian, our hosts felt that we should be spared the tourist trap they were running). This cemented in me a love of yurts, Mongolian horses, and cute Mongolian men. The Splendid China Mongolians had a bunch of horses, and you could pay 20 yuan to ride around the arena on one doubled up with a Mongolian rider. Obviously we had to do it. I knew that Athena has a natural seat on a horse, and so I felt no qualms about putting her on one, she didn’t feel any qualms either, especially as she got to ride with a pretty woman in what looked like bubblegum pink scrubs. I hopped on with some guy, and we set off around the arena. Mongolian saddles are uncomfortable wooden affairs, that encourage the proper use of one’s thighs while riding (if you are gripping with your thighs, it minimizes your bouncing). I got to gallop, and Athena’s mount got up to a canter (most of the other kids we saw riding were older than Athena, and their Mongolian riders kept their mounts at an easy trot). After we got off, Athena’s whole face was twisted into a wild grin and she was waving her hands around while walking in circles doing some sort of lamaze breathing. The excitement was, apparently, almost too much for her.
Athena after our first go on the horses.
We went and bought my ticket for the Horse Battle, and walked through the Korean House. Standing outside of the Korean House once more, Athena and I looked at each other, eyes sparkling. I said, “Should we go for another ride before the horse show?” And Athena was off and running for the horses. On this circuit, my rider and I passed Athena and then heard this sort of strangled yell. We both looked over our shoulders expecting to see Athena dangling from the saddle by one foot or something, and instead saw Athena’s face split into a huge smile as she threw her head back and laughed, her rider giggling behind her.
The horse battle arena.
Horse battle rider.
The Horse Battle was amazing. It started with two riders streaking around the arena carrying smoking torches, to create the misty early morning atmosphere that is required for the start of any epic battle. The horses and riders moved as one and they all moved dang fast while at the same time seeming to be suspended above such earthly things as gravity. The riders had billowing capes and some carried the flag of their warlord or whatever he was supposed to be. They demonstrated their horsemanship and vaulting abilities, standing on horseback, jumping from one side of the horse to the other, hanging from one side of the saddle, doing flips and somersaults up and down the horses’ backs, all while galloping across the arena. Soaring music pumped into the audience, making all our hearts throb as one, and I couldn’t help but be carried away, sucked into the scene unfolding in the arena. I could feel Athena leaving my lap on the tide of the music, being drawn into the battle, into the match of skill with a pike on horseback, even while my arms were still wrapped tightly around her torso, which was rigid with attentiveness. It was all over all too soon. Athena returned from the trance of the battle with a look of confusion on her face, “I thought it would be much longer,” she said wistfully. Obviously, we had to go back for another ride.
Athena scales the Great Wall.
Athena knocking on the door of Islam.
Athena harasses the Terra Cotta Warriors.
After getting all sugared up and over stimulated in the Folk Village, Athena and I turned our attention to the miniatures park. I had the feeling of unleashing Athena on an unsuspecting populous as she scrambled out of the Walmart stroller and commenced on a manic jog through the gardens, making zombie-esque noises, and joyfully gnashing her teeth. We cruised the Great Wall, harasassed the Teracotta Warriors, skipped through the Imperial Palace, and went by most of the other monuments too quickly for me to figure out what they were. I think this is my favorite way to see miniatures. After one last ice cream, we left the park and headed home.
The next morning, I asked Athena what she had dreamed about, “Riding horses,” she answered in a voice still heavy with sleep. “Me too,” I said, and we grinned like maniacs at each other.
Ice Skating
05 Oct 2011 3 Comments
in General Updates, National Day 7 Day Vacation
Yes, they have them in China.
There are an alarming number of malls in Shenzhen. And they are large, and ritzy. Malls in Shenzhen are a different experience than malls in the Great Northwest. It’s not just surly pre-teens that loiter around in them, it’s a much larger and more varied group of people. Aged women with gnarled hands and weathered faces walk the multi-storied floors, winging their arms in a kind of breast stroke. They would be in the mall-walker set back in the states. Here, the mall walker set is liable to spend the whole day at the mall, not just do a few laps in the morning and then clear out. Then there are the professionals who haunt Starbucks, the hordes of high school students, and the multi-generational families who take up residence in the food court. Most of the shops in the mall are generally devoid of customers. In response to the populous’s inclination to hang about in highly air conditioned environments, the malls all have some kind of place conducive to loitering about in.
On Sunday, Athena and I discovered perhaps the largest, ritziest mall on offer, the MixC. The most important thing about the MixC is the large bookstore next door, which was our destination on our Sunday outing. The second most important thing about the MixC is the purportedly Olympic-sized ice rink that has lodged itself on the fourth floor. We discovered it after we’d finished up in the bookstore. Athena caught sight of it, and was completely mesmerized. We plopped ourselves down on the balcony loitering area, and Athena watched the holiday-makers clinging to the wall and toppling over, and the figure-skating wonderkids with rapt attention, while I watched Athena. Then they cleared the ice and brought out the Zamboni.
Ice cream at the ice rink.
The Zamboni is pretty much the best part of any ice rink related activity, and I couldn’t help but regale Athena with tales of Zamboni watching from my youth. I told Athena about my cousin Alvin and I getting in trouble for playing in the admittedly nasty ice shavings from the hockey rink during one of my cousin Malcolm’s games. Athena was fascinated. She sat pensively while the Zamboni went back into its little garage and the skaters came back on. After a few minutes she looked up at me and said, “Mom, when I’m a little older, can you take me to a hockey game so I can see people hit stuff?”
By the end of our ice-rink observation, Athena had made a convincing case for going ice skating, and we made plans to come back the next day. The last time either of us had been on the ice was when I was five months pregnant with Athena. She found this difficult to wrap her head around, “So, how did you get onto the ice with me? How did we fit?”
The next morning, Athena had shifted into her scarily focused mode, in which she allows nothing to come between herself and her objective. There were none of her characteristic arguments about getting dressed, she listened very carefully to my explanation of why she needed to wear jeans and socks. And, at the ice rink she put up no fuss about the gloves or the tightness of her skates. We bought tickets for a two hour session and we spent every minute of it on the ice. The first hour was spent in slow circumnavigations of the rink while Athena got a feel for the ice and I passed on the scant knowledge I have about how to skate. I was actually pretty pleased with myself; I remained solidly upright on the ice, skated steadily along beside Athena, and picked her up from the few topples that she took without losing my own balance. After an hour of this, Athena told me to go skate around the rink and leave her be. I put her into the end of the rink that was barricaded off for small, beginning skaters to putter about in, and left her be, stopping on each of my circuits to check in with her. She maintained her high level of focus the entire time she was on the ice, and by the end of the session she asked to be put back in the big rink and had made several competent circuits on her own.
When we got off of the ice she was beaming with her success. We ate a late lunch and made our way onto the Metro. She climbed onto my back and fell into a contented, limp sleep on the way home.
