Making New Friends

Spring is the perfect time to get outdoors to enjoy the occasional sunshine and beautiful green grass. (If you live in Seattle, that is. All of you Phoenicians who are eating up the beautiful weather every single day in April, I'm jealous.) It seems children appear all over the city here when the sun creeps out. This is one of Audette's favorite reasons to go outside, to meet new friends.

I am a relatively outgoing person and I don't have a problem talking to strangers, but because my family (as a collective three) is OVERLY outgoing, sometimes I tell Eric to help me keep Audi out of people's personal space. She doesn't need to hug EVERY kid or touch EVERY dog or try and hold hands with EVERY adult. I get nervous that some people don't know how to handle little ones or that they are bothered by them. I don't know what type of person you are, but my tendency to hold back isn't always the best idea. At least I changed my perspective, after the experience we had this past evening.

We were on a huge stretch of grass at a park overlooking the Sound, when off in the distance, Audette spotted a little girl. Her immediate reaction was to run to her and hug her, which she did, much to my chagrin, especially when I saw the girl recoil. The father of this girl quickly ran up to the two little ones and Eric made his way over as well, as soon as I rushed him along. I stood back and watched the encounter. Pretty soon Eric and this dad were deep in conversation and the dad was kneeling down on the grass with the two little girls. After minutes passed I decided to make my way over to the group. I started to piece together their conversation. This little 2 year old was blind and had been running around listening to her dad's voice, trying to recognize the images in front of her. She was going through several surgical procedures to help her vision, after being born blind, and was regaining some of her ability to see blurry objects that were right in front of her. She may have been a little intimidated by Audette's gregarious greeting, but her dad was on his knees in the grass with his daughter, teaching her and encouraging her to interact with and try to see this new friend as someone just like her. There is truly no better way to help a little one learn than to allow her to be involved in the teaching process. I hope I never squash Audette's desire to love other people, even if she oversteps her boundaries a little, because it was such a treat to see Audette help this dad teach his beautiful little girl the importance of other people and making new friends no matter what her limitations may have been.