Come Here Often?

In my previous post, I may have implied that the baby was preventing me from walking in the cold and dark that is February. In truth, of our little family of three (five if you count Luca and Oz, the heat-seeking cats who crowd us out of bed every night), A is the most equanimous in the face of freezing temperatures.

With the later sunset, a clear sky and a temperature slightly above freezing this evening, I thought we could brave the walk home after work. A few blocks in, it was clear A wasn't having it -- he was tired, cranky, in need of a nap an hour previously. I sang a few rounds of Doe, a Deer, and he was out.

(Tangentially: why can I only keep one or two songs at the ready at any given time? Lately, we've had a lot of Doe, a Deer; She'll Be Comin' 'Round the Mountain, complete with the "kill the old red rooster" line which is a little shocking, but absolutely necessary to the sense of the song; and the Wheels on the Bus, god help me, a song I swore I'd never sing to my children after suffering through it with my younger nieces and nephews, but which turns out to be a crowd pleaser.)

I kept going, despite the sleeping baby, through Madison Square Park, past the Shake Shack that had no line -- I could have had my daily limit of delicious sodium, no waiting -- past several snowmen of the three-lump variety. Then there was this duo, delicately carved, lounging, enjoying the twilight.