ask a kid

In October, I travelled to the west coast to visit friends. This was way before I decided I would move there. Anyway, it had been awhile and it was good to see so many friends among so many tall trees.

As we are getting older, more of my friends have kids. And more of their kids are no longer babies. I know Pat and Grace from the Bay Area. We met before Aggie was born. I was glad for a few days at their new place in Tacoma with Aggie and Harry, even getting to experience Trunk or Treating with them, showing up in my cameo roll as the weird Aunt at the event at Harry’s school.

At Oly Zine Fest, artnoose told me about her 7 year old. and our host, Kelsey, talked about her kid who is grown now.

As my trip was cut short for work, I chose an old friend in Portland over new letterpress friends (I’ll be back!) because his kid is now 8 and I had not yet met him.

Arlo was 7 3/4 when we met and within an hour we talked about crystals, rocks and what we carry in our pockets. We went to OMSI and he showed me the fish and the lizards too.

I realized that aside from teaching, I don’t spend much time talking with kids. I’ve never wanted kids and though I like teaching, I wasn’t sure I was any good at talking with them. Then what I realized is that you just have to listen. It’s a lot. Kids say a million things in a minute, making connections I can’t keep up with. That’s what’s fun.

I know I have a lot of friends who don’t like kids and I get it. Groups of kids are hard for some people but groups of adults can be hard too. Kids have a range of personalities and I realized that the quiet, focused ones are easy to talk to, well , as easy as anyone else. So I wanted to make a postcard for the kids.

I called Arlo’s dad, Adam, for advice about wording the question I wanted to ask. He checked with Arlo, who said it was a good question. And then Arlo made his own Keep Writing to ask me a question. He mimicked my form, telling a story and then asking a question about the story. It is my favorite fan mail yet.

Adam and Arlo keep chameleons at their place in Portland. If you want to hear about it, you can check out the Chameleon Breeder’s podcast where they talk about kids taking care of chameleons.

from Arlo’s Keep Writing to me