Networking Snafu

May 4, 2011

Tonight we were planning to go to the Big and Little Networking group at the BBBS office.  This is a group (I think different Bigs/Littles each time) that get together to talk about how their match is going.  It's meant for new matches to discuss ideas for outings, how to deal with any issues that have come up, and just to meet some new people. When I mentioned this was our plan for the evening L's reaction was "Is it going to be boring?"  My answer - let's just go check it out, I don't know what it's going to be.  

We had some time to kill before it started and I made a couple of suggestions, all of which were shot down pretty quickly.  “What do YOU want to do?” I asked.  Without hesitation she said “Comstock Park!”  I had no idea what or where Comstock Park is but she said she could direct me and, yes, I trusted a 9-year-old to get me there.  We couldn’t get THAT lost, right, and it might be fun to see where we end up if we do.  After all, this is an adventure.  She told me where to go and to my surprise there was Comstock Park.  This is a neighborhood park with a big jungle gym type structure, monkey bars, swings, etc.  We raced to the swings and swung out little hearts out.  She did the monkey bars (all by herself I must add) and went up and down the slides, more swings, and then she was done.   

Well, that killed some time, now off to find something to eat before this networking thing.  When I picked her up I had given her a copy of Tales of a Fourth Grade Nothing by Judy Blume, a book I read when I was her age.  She didn’t ask for the radio on as she usually does, this time she asked if she could read out loud as we drove.  “Of course!!! I’d love that!” I told her.  She read to me about Peter and Fudge and Dribble as we made our way through town and to Kinder’s where we had a quick dinner...she chose chicken fingers and I had a veggie sandwich.   

We got to BBBS just on time and when we entered there was nobody else in the conference room (which you can see from the front desk).  Was everybody meeting in a different room? Did I have the wrong date, wrong time? Did it get canceled? The receptionist told us to have a seat and another woman came in to tell us that yes, unfortunately it has been canceled.  Darn!  What are we going to do now?  Again I threw out a couple of suggestions...all shot down.  “What do YOU want to do?” I asked.  Without skipping a beat she chose Learning Express toys (again) and the yogurt store...so that’s what we did and what fun we had!!

Until our next adventure . . .