Categories: uncategorized
Date: 13 April 2004 19:51:25
S: Mummy? How do I know my sister gets the kisses I send to her at bedtime?
M: Oh, you can be sure she gets them. She knows you're sending her a kiss.
S: But how can she? I mean, I never feel them arrive from her.
M: That's because they're special kisses. They don't touch your skin like ordinary kisses, they go straight to your heart and get stored up there. You feel inside your heart - can you feel how much she loves you?
S: Yes, yes I can. Are those all her kisses?
M:Yes, she loves you very much and your heart stores up all that love, so you can feel it anytime you want to.
S: Then you must send me lots and lots of kisses mummy, don't you? cos I can feel all that love inside me from you.
I am in love with my son. It is times like that which are reward beyond price.
We had a lovely day today with his sister and the foster family. I get on really well with her foster mum, and Tiddles and the other foster child are like peas in a pod and thoroughly enjoy each other's company, racing off into the woods to explore, playing hide and seek, digging for lugworms on the beach together. It was a beautiful spring day and just perfect for walking along the beach, first one on the north coast of the Island and then later in the afternoon one on the South coast where the boys were fascinated by the presence of fossils (No, I don't mean me and the foster mum, either!) and a petrified pine forest from some 135 million years ago, give or take. I've promised I will try to get them on a fossil hunt in the summer as I was a poor paleantologist and failed to give satisfaction in my identification of the "fossils" they found.
They also found blue slipper mud in abundance. The Island is rife with this stuff - deceptively firm until you step on it and then find yourself encased in a tenacious blue clay. Tiddles' friend came off the worst. His smart navy trainers completely changed colour and he had to resort to socks while they attempted (in vain) to get off the layer of mud. None of the children's trousers will ever be the same again - the sister will one day learn not to wear her best clothes when she comes to visit Smudgelet!
Smudgelet himself learned a lesson in life.. and one he didn't like much either. Tiddles found a massive plastic bottle on the beach and was determined to carry it all the way back to the cafe to throw it in the bin and keep the beach tidy. He's a good lad! He carried this bottle on the end of a stick for ages, and Smudgelet tried every subterfuge in the book to get it off him, until finally he gave in and let him have it, whereupon Smudgelet decided he would see how far into the sea he could throw it. He suddenly discovered that a) we do not throw litter deliberately on the beach or in the sea and b) after having been plagued to part with the bottle, Tiddles had no intention of taking it back and c) it was a long long way to carry it to the cafe! He never quite cottoned on that if he stopped moaning for a moment or two, I'd have carried it for him. As it was, he had a long walk home, bottle in hand. We don't call him "Sir Moanalot" for nothing! ;-)