Photos by Sonja, comments by Andy.
May 30: Another weekend day down “south” (around San Jose) to enjoy the warm weather. I think we’d be reluctant to admit it, but it’s too cold in San Bruno for us. Even when the sun shines, the wind blows over the hills from the ocean and it is chilly most of the day. So we often find ourselves driving 20-30 miles south for the day, where it usually stays warm as long as the sun is up.
Rancho San Antonio park has a farm with some animals for the children to see, after a 1 mile walk, so it’s always a good destination. This time we discovered it also has a creek to play in:
The goats had 1-week old kids:
The way children interact is fun to watch. A lot of children end up around the animal pens. The first children Leilani saw, she ran up to them and said “Hi, my name is Leilani, do you want to play?” They completely ignored her, pretended she didn’t even exist. I told Leilani the children were busy with their own games and that she should try to be not so straightforward and more engaging.
The second time Leilani tried to make friends, she and another girl were stalking the farm cat. I thought this had a chance of succeeding, the two girl were showing a common interest. Then they got upset about who saw the cat first and how that might give some privilege. Then the girl picked up the cat as if it were hers and walked back to her family who were sitting in the shade. It was so surreal that I understand how Leilani didn’t really know how to react.
The third time was a charm, literally. Both were held up by their parents to see the goats, and started a conversation that first was all about counting the goats, and then Leilani started to clown around and they made each other laugh. Soon they were running around and Leilani wanted to race with him. Then they climbed on some stumps and jumped around, then they both wanted to see inside the barn:
They they found some real common ground, making faces:
It turns out that Seyon and his family are like us: we both moved to the Bay Area recently, and lived in Europe before that.
He had ridden his bike to the farm, but walked all the way back with Leilani, playing tag, scaring each other with monster noises, and dragging on the daddy:
Leilani showed him her two favorite trees. The hollow hobbit tree:
And the fairy house tree ring (of California bay trees that smell so good) where they played house and danced together:
