Priorities Department

Mari (pronounced Mar-ee) is four (pronounced “I’m four!”). She’s our youngest granddaughter and now gets to sit back there in a booster seat when she’s in the car. No more of those baby seats for her. No siree! She’s all grown up and independent.

Yesterday, I got the remarkable gift to drive her around in my pickup a little while. Ever been thrilled to sit in the front? Well, we put her booster seat in my pickup and I set her in it and buckled her down. “I get to sit in the front! I never saw out the front before!”

Kids look at everything, don’t they? Pretty soon Mari spied the crank that rolls the window up and down. “What’s that, Granddaddy?”

“Well, you turn that to make the window go up and down.” She looked at me like I was a mad scientist trying to pull her leg. “Well, my pickup doesn’t have buttons like your car,” I explained.

“Oh. Can I try it?” she asked.

“Sure.”

She worked hard, but got it to move a little. She was quite the proud little princess. “Oooh, that’s cold,” I complained. “Roll it up.” She turned it the other way to get it back up. Sorta. Apparently I was not the mad scientist, after all.

“Granddaddy, when it gets hot can I come over to your house and turn it all the way down?”

“Of course,” I said. “That’ll be fun, won’t it?”

“And then can we go swimming?”