Kid Assembles Band of Marauding Acquaintances At Park

Our friend Ada and her little brother Julian cajoled their mother into driving to Williamsburg yesterday to see Ari the Singalong Guy—Kina’s favorite local children’s performer—and eat free cookies. Having enjoyed the performance and consumed the free cookies, the three kids decamped to the big playground nearby and encountered yet another of Kina’s park acquaintances, a little girl named Adele. Together, they all scooted around like old friends and glommed onto still more children, including a little boy whose grandfather was quietly reading him stories from Highlights magazine. The girls sat on the bench next to them and hovered uncomfortably close, eating pizza. I eventually offered the boy a slice just to make it less weird.

Childhood friendships are so easy! They appear to be based mostly on two kids being of similar heights and the shared availability of scooters, lacking all the senseless drama of adult friendships. That five kids who basically didn’t know each other three hours prior could end up all eating ice cream together in the middle of the afternoon feels like a miracle of human behavior to me, and it reminds me how much I owe my actual adult friends a call.

Give me a holler if you want to hang out and scoot, friends.

dad