So much depends on small yellow boots

We lost our tomatoes last night.  They froze.  So did our windshield.  But I refused to accept that as truth; I wouldn’t scrape the windshield.  I just pulled out of the driveway and faced the car into the sun and ran the windshield wipers till I could see.

I drove down to the pasture.  The grass there was white with frost.  When I got out to unlock the gate, I saw, just down the street a bit, a very small person—standing by the side of the road.  Center Street used to be a sleepy farm/recreational road.  Now that there’s a flight school and firefighter school and who knows what else down at our burgeoning little airport, Center is bumper to bumper at around eight in the morning, at noon, and again at five.  Not a the kind of place you’d want your kid to be standing, then, at eight in the morning.

I wish I had a picture of this: close your eyes while you read and imagine, please.  Cray, who is about two feet tall, was all dressed in his bright red hoody, his jammies, and his bright yellow rain boots, just standing there, watching the cars drive by.    If there had been a bench beside him, I’d have sworn he was patiently waiting for a bus.  I started walking down that way, not wanting to scare him, but a little worried about the traffic and bad guys and the possibility of his freezing to death.

Arms crossed and shivering, Cray squinted up at me.  “Whatcha doin’ out here?” I asked him.  Waiting for his nanny, he said.  I made a few other short comments, pointing out how cold it was and asking if his mom had already left for work.  Yes, mom was gone.  And he was just waiting for a car that his nanny would be driving and it would stop and pick him up and drive him the rest of the way home.  Which meant the driveway just around the corner.  I figured his dad had no idea Cray was out there.  And this was true.

His dad is an EXCELLENT father, I want to point out here.  I have never seen a man play so wonderfully with his kids.  It’s just, they get away from you sometimes.  It even happened to us from time to time, and we were the over-protective parents from hell.  So I walked him back to his door.  “Good thing I wore my jacket,” he said, peering up at me, his teeth chattering in his little blond head.  I sent him in after his dad.

 When S came to the door, he was happy to see me, and still without a clue. He told me,  “Cray came up to my room and said, ‘Crazy Lady is here.’”  Cray said this, not necessarily because I am certifiable, but because S always calls me that when he yells across the pasture to say hello: he thinks I spend way too much time training and not enough time riding, which is true.  So now Cray thinks this is my name. 

Later, S asked Cray why he had been waiting.  “She doesn’t pick you up at home.  You go to school, and she picks you up from there, after.”

“Oh, yes,” Cray said.  “I forgot that.”

Hopefully, he will remember tomorrow. 

Though I will miss seeing those brave yellow boots.