Down Home: Grandkids, snowmen and a busy weekend

We made history early this month. For the first time, both our grandchildren and both their mothers spent a long weekend under our roof.

Ezra, our 4-year-old grandson who lives in Buda, has visited Joanna and me many times. But this was the first opportunity for 3-month-old Eleanor, who lives in Nashville, to come see us.

We rolled out the red carpet—or, more appropriately for a 4-year-old boy, the white snow.

I probably won’t mention this when Eleanor is old enough to understand, but Ezra was far more excited about seeing snow for the first time than about meeting his baby cousin. 

A little boy just doesn’t stop

Little boys are like that. If you can’t or won’t play, he questions your value. Well, that’s not right. A little boy doesn’t stop to consider worth. Actually, a little boy just doesn’t stop.

That’s fine with me, at least as long as I don’t stop long enough to consider the implications of our 54-year age span. Ezra goes to bed revving his little engine faster than mine runs all day. How can someone that small never stop running and talking—at the same time?

Ezra and I have a wonderful relationship. That’s because I know my job. Where he’s concerned, I’m the purveyor of play, the concierge of comedy, the meister of mirth, the gadfly of games, the raconteur of rasslin’. In Ezraworld, I exist for his great fun.

And I’m good with that. Because when he’s having fun, so am I. 

Ready to play in the snow

Before Ezra and Lindsay arrived, I pulled out my coat, cap and gloves, so I’d be ready to play in the snow as soon as he sprung free of his carseat.

Ezra lives 18.47 miles south of the Texas Capitol. Folks don’t get much snow that far down. In fact, Ezra had not seen snow until he arrived in North Texas for his visit with Marvo (and Jody, and Aunt Molly and Eleanor). 

We hit the white stuff almost immediately. For the record, Ezra generates far more energy than I. But never underestimate the assets of age—wiliness, experience and cunning—and a pretty good arm. I won our snowball fight by about 85 snowballs to three.

Fortunately for Ezra—but not so much for the 6.7 million other souls in the Dallas-Fort Worth area—the temperature remained cold that night. That meant plenty of snow for Day 2. That’s when we built three snowmen. Or, judging by their height, snowchildren. 

Constructing snowmen

Jody supplied carrots for noses and raisins for eyes. Ezra fetched sticks for arms and hair. And as long as we stuck to the moist almost-ready-to-melt snow, we rolled it up into passable snowhumans. 

By Day 3, just about all the other snow melted. But our little snowpeople hung in there. Eyeless and noseless, but with stick arms and stick hair. And what appeared to be world-class snow-scoliosis.

Of course, I’d love to tell you Ezra charmed his new cousin by singing “If You’re Happy and You Know It” or “There’s Power in the Blood,” two of his favorite songs. But Ezra never slowed down that long, and Eleanor probably wouldn’t have noticed, anyway. A boy doesn’t have time for playing with babies when he’s got basketball, Chutes ’n’ Ladders, Batman Uno, video games on a cell phone, football, Hungry Hungry Hippos and wrestling.

For her part, Eleanor charmed her great-grandparents, great-aunts and great-uncle, grandparents, aunt and mama by cooing and smiling and generally exuding 11 pounds of cuteness. 

Snowmen’s demise

By Sunday afternoon, when Ezra and his mama packed to leave, we crossed the front yard to their car. He walked over and looked down on the tiny pile of carrots, raisins and sticks, the remaining residue of our snowfolks.

“Our snowmen died, Marvo,” he called out.

“I know, Ezra,” I replied. “It’s warmer. I’m sorry.”

“They’re in heaven now,” he surmised.

I guess they wouldn’t last long if they went the other direction.