Three blocks.

Three blocks. He stops at every fake flower to dust off frost. He studies insect tracks. He admires stick bugs like miracle creatures.

I want to hurry him. I don’t hurry him.

This is the paradox of adulthood:

I need to get to work. He needs to be six.

I used to pick him up at 3 p.m. after finishing murals. We’d go for cake pops. Gather pears. Collect black walnuts. Wander. Now I have a day job, and our time has shrunk to an hour and a half in the evening.

I mourn it. I mourn it a lot.

But I try to remember:

He is only this age once. And I want him to live in his own time, not mine.