Wishful Thinking

I live in a condo that overlooks a beautiful park on Bellingham Bay. I sit on my couch I can see only the ever-changing landscape of sea and sky. I can remember visiting the park prior to our move to this location. I would look up with unspeakable resentment at the balconies above me and the people sunning themselves there. Never in my wildest dream did I ever expect to be one of those lucky people. Thanks be that the Professor's dreams are larger than mine and a sunny summer day now finds me puttering on the deck.

The one drawback to living on the hill is that we have no access to the park below. We daily walk briskly walk around the long block and down the the hill to the waiting beach. And then we haul ourselves at our wander's end up and up and up that same, but now seemingly endless, hill to our street. Because of the proximity, we cannot justify a drive, not that we could find parking there if we could. So unless I am doing a photo shoot and hauling clients, our feet travel the hill.

The park was a favorite place for any of the children who visit and our grandchildren have traveled that hill with us for years. Early on they would beg to be carried and often got their wish from Poppi, as he got some kind of manly pleasure from the ability to accomplish the task. Those days were replaced replaced with a regular conversation, complete with huffing and puffing, on our return home.

As we began the climb one of us will call out, "If I had a super power, I would choose to fly!" This declaration was always followed by numerous solutions to our having to endure the discomfort of the climb. These powers included the ability to "beam up," or magically fly (with or without wings or propulsion), psychic powers of relocation and to create a reverse zip line to the balcony, to name a few.

We don't to have them visit here as much these days, but when the Professor and I wander down to the park, inevitably one or the other of us will take up the super power conversation in honor of the many trips our grandchildren made with us.