And then we'll quietly grow old

Hearts are sunny and Miller Lite flows like ambrosia. In today's adventures...

BE A KID AGAIN. Recommended by Nicole Stoops.

What could be better?

#1: Spend time with (other) kids.

I spent the afternoon with an old friend I hadn't seen for more than 10 years, and her 3 year old son, Alec. He insisted on removing all his clothes for the whole day, and though I couldn't get away with that, I did follow the naked little monkey as he careened crazily around the driveway on his big wheel, with a bucket on his head. The bucket covered his whole head, and he kept bumping into walls and bushes. Have you ever talked to a three year old? They don't make any sense, and they're absolutely wonderful.

Alec: That's amazing!
Me: What's amazing?
Alec: The power! It's my power!
Me: Oh!
Alec: I can ride with that, I don't want to eat my sandwich.
Me: You should eat your sandwich so you're not hungry!
Alec: No! I'm a fish!

He asked me to dance with him, and we spun around in circles on the driveway, kicking our feet up at crazy angles. I laughed until it was hard to breathe.

#2: Run through the sprinkler.

I used to spend hours in the sprinkler. The art of the sprinkler is in anticipation. My favorite kind is the waving fan, where you can lie in the grass on one side of it, with your friend lying on the other side, and your stomach cramps up with nervousness while you're wating for the water to hit, even though you know exactly how great it's going to feel when it does. It was kind of a cloudy day, and not very warm, but I pulled the car over next to a sprinkler in someone else's yard, on the other side of town, and raced into it, holding my breath. It was freezing, the way sprinklers always are before you get used to them. I waited till the streams of water were spraying straight up again, and let it hit my forehead for a second before I jumped through to the other side again. A man came out from the house and stood on his stoop. He was wearing a Packers shirt, the unofficial uniform of the entire state (I wore mine yesterday). "Hi!" I shouted, gleefully, and sprinted back to the car. "Thanks!" I was screaming a lot louder than I had to. As I drove away, I checked for him in the rearview mirror. He was waving goodbye.

#3: Eat a popsicle.
When I was small, popsicles were a big part of the summer. Our favorites were banana, root beer and blue raspberry. I always had sticky hands from the dripping; popsicles melt fast in the summer. But today I was far away from the grocery store. And popsicles are so much more delicious when it's hot. There was a gas station by the lake having a brat fry, so I stopped for that instead. Bratwurst is serious business in Wisconsin. Neighbors have criticized my decision to live in New York, based on the relative unavailability of bratwurst there. Connoseurs marinate them overnight in beer. Some people insist on stuffing them with cheese. The meat section at the grocery store has a whole row dedicated to them (I've taken pictures of it). My personal favorite is a beer brat on a toasted bun with a lot of mustard. At the gas station, everyone was drunk, including the man grilling the brats. He tripped as he was handing me my brat, and dropped it in the dirt. "Holy balls!", he shouted. "I am WASTED!" He tried to get me to have a beer. I said I couldn't, I was driving. He said, inexplicably, "that didn't stop Jesus!" Before I had the chance to ask what he meant, a fight broke out by the beer cooler. One of the men involved suddenly keeled over like a tree falling over. It was something that everyone there, including me, had seen before. People in Wisconsin drink like champs.

*This update typed while listening to the dog chew his squeaking toy, until it drove me crazy and I had to hide it.