Ford – Page 33 – Stephanie Sicore

September 19, 2005

Museum Day

Today was Museum Day in Austin, when all the museums are open to the public, free of charge. Most of them also hosted fun kid-centric activities, like making seed balls and collages at the Ladybird Johnson Wildflower Center. Because it was noon, and white hot outside, we decided to head on over for some masochistic martyrdom at the Wildfower Center, where we could either bake to death outside in the beautifully landscaped terrace or pressure cook till our eyes popped out in the Little House, aka Little Barely-Air-Conditioned Room Where the Children Hang. So we decided to share the best of both worlds, and I took Ford to the House while Damon and Chas kicked back in the brick oven.

Lois Ehlert is in town, and while she was signing her picture books that we left at home, Ford and I made Leaf Man-inspired collages:

While working on them, I paused to take a break and admire all the children at work on their collages. Ford had squirted huge silver dollar-sized dabs of Elmer’s glue onto his paper and stuck, very gingerly atop it, thin strands of dried grasses. It was so cute. An eight year-old across the table scanned this and then looked at me, scrunching up her face, and asked “Why did he use such a big glob of glue?” Before answering, I smiled, immediately thinking of the way Ford and I laugh together at Chas’ “mistakes” all of the time, and the way he in so many words, asks the same of Chas when he makes a “mess.”
“Oh, Chas! What are you doing?” Ford will say, and laugh in a very infectious way.

September 17, 2005

Austin Nature Center

With all the company we’ve had the past week or so, it has been easy for me to forget what it’s like being around Ford, when he is not competing for attention between one or more babies. His enthusiasm, when he is engaged, is really unbridled. Unbridled engagement. That sounds weird.

Today we rediscovered the Austin Nature Center. In May I took the boys there, but we didn’t make it past the first tier of exploration; today, we stepped throught the back door and into the rest of the museum. It’s such a gem! They have a collection of native animals in the form of a miniature zoo, so the kids can see a coyote or a ringtail or coati or raccoon walk feet in front of them. No annoying cotton candy vendors along the way. It’s small, shaded, and in the middle of town. There were several trails adjacent to the animal enclosures that we earmarked for later. Today’s focus was the outdoor dinosaur dig.

Ford asked a ton of questions about the Pleisosaur fossil model. “What bone is this, mommy?”
“It’s a phalange, but look how many there are on his pointer finger!”
“One, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine,”
I ask “How many are on your pointer finger?” I help him identify them:
“One, two, three..”
“Three! That’s not quite as many as the Pleisosaur, huh?”

“Mommy, what’s this bone?” Points at some kind of wrist bone.
“That looks like a wrist bone, maybe a metacarpal?”
“Where is my metacarpal?”
I take his hand and poke around towards his wrist, nearly in the same area. “Right in here are several metacarpals. But in your hand, the wrist bones that you feel are actually part of your arm bones!”
“What are your arm bones called?”
“The radius (I point to the bony prominence on the distal radial head) and the ulna (yada yada).”
He lays his hand down upon the “fossil” remains.

Chas kept crawling in and out of the Pleisosaur mouth. He does that a lot. I mean, he’s not particular to Pleisosaur fossils, but if there is a cozy nook then he must rearrange the contents so that he can wedge his round bottom into it. He will systematically throw Hot Wheels out of the toybox until none remain in the small box, then squirrel around inside the box like a restless dog until he’s comfortable. And then he’ll sigh, sometimes clap. And then claps some more. And grunt, smiling. It’s very cute.

September 15, 2005

surprise

Ford is an expressive, independent kid, and I’ve never tried to squash the juice out of him by making him “draw things” or label his art. Naturally, I would think, his artwork would be as it usually appears: more evocative than representational. He usually begins a piece by slowly dabbing and stroking the paper with paint, and then begins to get physical with the medium by testing the limits of the brush against brute strength(how hard can I jab the brush into the paper? how many times can I do this over and over again before something gives? this feels GOOD!) until finally, his piece resembles a meteor storm or a hurricane, or a dance, or a race. His work is never static.

I was in a funk after Jim and Alis left, feeling vaguely cathartic, venting, and extremely tired, when I began to sob. This consumed Ford, and he began to offer to buy me various things which he thought might make me happy again. I told him that I didn’t really want him to buy me anything, but that I would appreciate a drawing instead. And continued to decompress, although I was charmed by his efforts.

About five minutes later he came upstairs and handed me this drawing. It is, according to him, a picture of me and I am smiling. Notice the long arm, of which my left is longer (I am left-handed) and the petite legs. The smile is uncontrived, very nice. This is his first fully representational drawing that he initiated on his own. And all for me, it is mine. Granted, I am not praising his newfound mastery of realism, but instead just amazed at how he has restrained this capability he already apparently has in order to be true to his art, to nurture his expressive style. I’m very proud of that.