Okay, what do you do with an insanely busy six-year old during spring break when long stretches of free time extend out before you and all you really want to do is lay on a beach somewhere warm? Well the kid likes art so I devised a color mixing experiment with water color pencils. He delightfully discovered that red and blue do indeed make purple and "brown and brown make BROWN!" and other newsworthy insights.
Next, we colored his hair red with gel and he promptly put on a cardigan and began parading around the house with his wand weilding a continuous diatribe about something nonsensical.
Next, we loaded up on the bike for a ride to the grocery store and park. We have a bike attachment and the goal is to ride in a semi-upright fashion but for Bodhi riding takes a second seat to the primary goal of maintaining a constant stream of TALK. As I tried to correct the waivers, baubles and horizontal riding strategies of my biking companion, I kept calling behind me, "BALANCE". To which Bodhi yelled ahead, "I AM TRYING TO BALANCE!". The teacher mom kicked in and I said, "Oh Bodhi you are doing a great job. Keep practicing." To which he replied, "Grown ups are always saying GOOD JOB but I think they are lying. I think they really mean YOU DON'T KNOW WHAT YOUR DOING but they want you to keep doing it!" Which of course made me laugh so hard I had to get off the bike.
On our way home from buying the ingredients for choroset Bodhi spotted a sweet young woman standing self consciously on the street corner holding up a tattered cardboard sign which asked for help. Her downturned eyes didn't register the six year old who had quickly hopped off his bike to hurry to her side, beaming a grin and bellowing, "HI!". He then dug into the cloth bag containing our recently purchased produce and held out a prime tangelo in his extended hand. She warmly accepted and he seemed to feel a little better about the painful fact that other people don't have a home like we do. Soon we were off again and as we neared the house I wondered if it was possible for someone's ears to actually bleed from a constant verbal onslaught.
Once home we made choroset for Pesach and Bodhi packed his backpack for an eagerly anticipated evening with his Dad. He just now left and the house feels like a mausoleum, utterly silent, and although I am exhausted and ready for silence, I find that without his constant buoyancy there is a quiet weight of loneliness which has become a regular companion lately. There is no one like Bodhi. No human could have more zest and eagerness for life than that boy. And no human could TALK with as much gusto and enthusiasm as Bodhi Samuel Katz, the One and Only.
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