The other night Shiloh and I had the hilarious privilege of watching our timid little Jesse experience a gymnasium floor for the first time. A floor, what's so interesting, or in Jesse's case, downright terrifying about that? A lot, in Jesse's eyes apparently! We went to a going away party for a dear friend's mother the other night and it was held in the gymnasium of a Church. We got there just as everyone was sitting down to eat so Jesse went straight from my hip to a high chair. Oh, but after dinner the show began. I got him out of his high chair and set him down of the floor at which point he glued himself to my leg. He tends to be clingy around new people so I chalked it up to stranger anxiety. Little did I know that it was a different kind of anxiety entirely! After some time, he caught sight of all the other kids running in and out to the gym's front double doors. They had free roam of all the other hallways, rooms and secret hide-a-ways in the building and were making full use of them. Jesse stood by me watching them for a couple of minutes and then decided he wanted to join in the obvious fun that was being enjoyed. I watched him walk around our table from chair to chair until he realized that route was not going to get him to the door. So, after some painful contemplation, he stretched, with one hand still clinging to a chair at my table, to reach a chair at the next table. Once successfully at that table he tried his chair route again, but alas, still found himself a good ten feet from the door, at which point he tried to silicate help from the little old men and women sitting at the table. Of course, since he can't talk yet, his cries for help were interpreted as adorable antics and certainly did not receive the response he was looking for. I pulled him back to me three times and each time he went through the same routine. The third time he made it to the chair closest to the door he gave up on the little old folks and tried instead to pull that chair with him. This however, was an utter failure due to the fact that there was someone sitting in the chair. He pulled and grunted, putting his full 23 lbs into it, for a good 30 seconds. Finally, realizing this was futile and now completely overwhelmed by the desire to go play with the other kids, he turned, faced the gym's exit, took a proverbial deep breath, stretched his arms out the sides and proceeded to shuffle his tiny little feet, in tiny little shuffles, until he finally made to the double doors! I, by the way, was now nearly falling off my chair from laughing so hard. From than on, for the rest of the night, he decided that so long as the strip of carpet running around the perimeter of the gym could get him there he was going, and if it couldn't it wasn't worth going to!
They aren't kidding when they say there can be night and day between siblings! Sometimes I wonder if Sarah even notices she is walking on a floor or just takes for granted that there will inevitably be a hard surface beneath her. She has always been more interested on the process of moving, with little care of how she is going to get there or even where she is going. If the other night was any indication, Jesse, I think, I hope, is going to be a little more calculated about his adventures.
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