Kaia smiles for the camera...

Awake, I take a peek in the other bedroom. She is near consciousness, wiggling and sighing. I grind my beans .... sure that she will hear me, brew my coffee and sit down to drink the steaming mug. The day has dawned cloudy. It looks like rain. I'm disappointed, the park sounded good today.

A few minutes later I see a little blonde head pop out from the door frame to the living room and back out of view again. So that's the game this morning, I see. I sit, studiedly not looking at the door to the hall where she quietly waits. Then, a face appears, contorted and shrieking at me ..... "boo", she cries, as I jump and shout at the sound. Laughing now, she comes over to climb into my lap.

"I really scared you", she says. Getting over my big fright of the morning, I laugh and say "yes you did". Never satisfied to get just one reaction from me, (she is four you know), she puts her hands over her eyes and proceeds to scare me all over again. We both know that Nonnie isn't really scared, but the boo and the noise and the laughing are so delicious that we play several more times before I tire and change the subject.

"How about breakfast, big girl" I ask and holding her hand, head to the kitchen to fix food for my always hungry granddaughter. "Do you have cantaloupe" she asks remembering her investigation of my refrigerator the past evening. "Of course, my love", I answer, and begin slicing.

Over breakfast we talk about our plans for the day. I tell her that I think the park will be too wet to play in today, the sand box soggy. Remembering her accidental adventure in a rain shower, on the fourth of July, she lobbies, "Nonnie, I want to go out anyway, please. "No, I say, envisioning a mess. Then I stop in my tracks and say to her "why not, it's 90 degrees out there and we're not likely to take a chill". Come on honey lets take Nonnie's big umbrella and walk in the rain"

Once out, and under the big umbrella, we walk leisurely along as everyone on the street hurries to get where they're going, out of the rain. Our neighbor who owns the Cuban restaurant on the corner is out in a doorway, smoking a cigarette. He is the only other person taking the rain easily and naturally. We laugh and tell him we are just out playing and he hides his cigarette, laughs with us, and waves as we pass on to the big rain puddle in a dip of the sidewalk.

I start to tell Kaia to step around the puddle but then remember that she has on her sandals made for hiking over streams and forest. Instead I stop and give her permission to jump which she is longing to do. With that, she lets go of my hand and jumps several times, up and down in the puddle. Not satisfied with jumping, she starts to do an improvised Irish jig, dancing and laughing, splashing my jeans with her puddle water.

I feel like a kid again, standing there wet and laughing, enjoying myself, the rain, my granddaughter, and the puddle.

After the puddle I take her in. She has maneuvered out from under the umbrella while jumping and dancing, and is soaked head to toe. A warm bath and fresh clothes return the house to normal and we settle down to play with horses and read books for the rest of our rainy day.