Our Walk to Remember

Big Brother Badger is a dreamer.  Starting from just an idea or a toy, he will create an entire story and become completely engrossed, intense, an entire world at his feet.  Growing up, I was like that, too.  Where I grew up was perfect-fifteen acres of woods and fields allowed for unlimited potential for imagination.  One day I would be pretending fairies lived amongst the moss and roots around an old tree, the next day I would be telling stories of sea creatures in a creek bed.  I would sit for hours on the gravel driveway, picking out rocks for a collection, or ride my bike in circles thinking up tall tales set in outer space.

The Little Badgers and I visited my parents recently, and the trees are still there.  The creek, the moss, the gravel driveway.  This place is so different from our own house.  The Badger clan lives closer to the hustle and bustle of a big city, where sidewalks and parks replace more secluded places.  When I take the children for walks near our house, I have to be on constant alert to keep them from straying into the path of a car, or near a strange dog, or too far from my side.  On this visit, on our walks, I could let them be free.  Free to play, to run, to disappear for a little while into the woods or behind a tree.  Free to be as I remember feeling as a child.  Free to explore and dream.

Watching the Little Badgers on our walks with Grandma, I saw each child play as if it were part of my own memories: Big Brother running as fast as the wind, arms outstretched and face alight, Little Brother methodically picking just the right stone from the driveway, Baby toddling down the road after the dog.

I find I now look at the woods and fields around my parents' house as if my years of adulthood had not happened.  As if I were a child again, seeing things as my children do.  All the places that beckon to be explored, the stories waiting to be told, the dreams just around the corner.  Familiar and exciting at the same time.  The sounds are the chatter of birds and the crunch of gravel beneath our feet, the brush of tall grass and the swish of dry leaves.  When we step outside on these walks, the air feels uplifting and fresh, almost asking us to look up to the sky instead of down at pavement.

Memory is a funny thing.  I don't know if the Little Badgers will remember everything they saw on these walks.  I don't know if they'll remember looking for deer, or watching for hawks, or jumping in each mud puddle as if it was the first one they had ever seen.  I don't know if they'll remember the smells of the leaves, or walking on a fallen tree, or watching their Mommy laugh with her own mother like best friends.  But I'll remember Big Brother telling me how much he loved being there, of Little Brother asking to carry rocks home as keepsakes, of Baby pointing and clapping at the dog's silly antics.  I'll remember, and be thankful for it.