Lake View Elementary School playground, home of lots of jungle gym slide sets, and the only playground I know of in town that's shaded at midday, thanks to a stand of lovely old oak trees. Far less than a mile from home, it's an easy bike ride.

So quick a bike ride, in fact, that U is usually not ready to get off the bike by the time we arrive. He grabs at his helmet, clutches at his bike seat straps, and otherwise shows that he wants more riding. So around the grassy field we go, threading our way through the tetherball poles and basketball hoops and whatever those buckets are up on a pole that will deposit your ball in any of four directions. I haven't been in a hurry to learn their name, because I figure I will soon enough. Up to the school building, and slaloming down the slopes. Sometimes Ulysses says, "Aa-aaa-aa-aaa-aa,"
listening to how the jerky hill makes his voice shake. Sometimes I do, now that he gave me the idea to.

Today there was a young couple there, couldn't have been past their mid-twenties, with a girl of about two wearing a checkered dress of regulation little-girl pink with a gathered skirt that formed a little bell.

I had greeted the man and girl the first time I tried to take U off the bike. I had waved and said hi to the mother, who was sitting by herself, as I rode by maybe a hundred feet away. She was looking straight towards me. As far as I could tell, she didn't answer. I said, "Hi!" again, louder, and waved harder. I still didn't hear an answer -- there were lots of cars going by -- but I thought I saw her jaw work in what might have been a little "hi." So I left it alone.

Now, as I leaned the bike against a tree and plucked U from his seat, the man was directing the girl on the playset. "Keep going! Up, up, up! All the way up! That's right! Now the next step. Good! Now up the next step." Next he would say, "Slide! Come on, now, slide!" Then, "That's right, go up! Keep on! Next step! Up!"

As we approached, I noticed he seemed to be stuck in "Slide!"  longer than usual. "Slide!" he said. "Come on. Slide! Slide down. Slide! Come on. Come on, Ally! Slide, now! Slide! Come on, slide down! Slide!"

All this made me look up at Ally to see what she was up to. She was perched at the top of a the highest slide in the park, and she was twisted around towards us, leaning her weight on her hands. She was watching Ulysses tottering towards her. He was looking up at her.

Suddenly my hearing cut through what up until then I hadn't noticed. In childish tones and half-formed prattle-like speech, she was speaking.

"Look! Baby!" she was saying, happily. "Baby!"

"Yes, a baby!" I said.

"Slide! Come on now, Ally. Slide!" Dad said.

"Baby go dow' slide?" said Ally. "Baby, baby! Baby ca' play slide!"

"Yes, the baby can go on the slide," I said. And then I couldn't resist, after a pause, adding, "If he wants to."