It’s happening out there

The cooler fall weather calls the the grandchildren to come out and play. Even10 month-old Katie whines when she has to come inside for a diaper change.
“She cries every time I close the backdoor with her inside,” her mamma said.
When I visited, the baby stood in a red plastic wagon watching the other kids play around her. She had so much more to see out there: the trees, the clouds and her big sisters and brother. Five year-old Daisy brought her a dish of Cheerios to eat then ran off to a “let’s pretend” in the fort on the top of their swing set.
When I arrived I was told, “Come in this other door. That way is a landmine of danger.” She indicated the row of chairs draped with blankets under the shelter of the three-sided garage. No car could park in the garage now that cooler weather beckoned the children to come out and create their own personal Occupy Village. Eli, 10, pointed out, “This one is mine. That’s Caroline’s and that one is Daisy’s.” The forts stayed intact at the end of the day. Imagination had dibs over tidy orderliness and neatly parked vehicles.
My son’s family lives on a dead end street across from a middle school. When the teachers and students leave, the three grandchildren have the entire parking lot and two huge fields for riding bikes, flying kites and playing soccer. Which is exactly what six-year-old Sam did Sunday morning. He put on his red soccer shirt, dark shorts, shin protectors and soccer shoes and took the red, white and blue kick ball to the field. He ran and kicked.
I came out to watch. There stood a four-feet high child in his soccer regalia, kicking the ball into the big net on the middle school’s field. One small child in a large field kicking the ball into the big goal. He came back to tell us all about his game and left the red, white and blue ball on the far end of the green field.
“Wow! What a game! I guess you had better go get the ball,” I said.
He looked out there, Such a long ways to back to the ball. His shoulders slumped.
He sighed, took a deep breath, grinned and his imagination clicked. He was a soccer player again, chugging along like the Little Engine That Could. A colorful red shirt in the middle of the green field, kicking a red and white and blue ball.
Three year-old Henry came out with the water blaster gun his mom had found during her shopping the previous day. He proudly lifted the blaster, pumped it and squirted a blast of water on the garden until he emptied the gun and had to go inside to refill. He refilled it many times as he washed the sides of the car and watered the cement sidewalk.
He pointed it at me.
“No, you don’t shoot people.” I said. He turned around and blasted the tree instead. He watered everything in sight while his mom fixed dinner. She came out and watched him obsessively pumping water, “He will be doing that for the next week,” she said.
Big sister, Sophia, 8, joined the water brigade for a while. Her interest waned long before the 3 year-old’s did. She grabbed her scooter and rolled down the sidewalk.
Outside. It’s where it happening this fall, I realized, as we returned to our quiet house where the kids no longer return home at the end of the day and we began planning another visit with grand kids.