Day at the Park

Today was a bright and sunny day, not a my-kind-of weather, but nevertheless an exuberant one. We had decided to take our toddler out today. My husband and I have been extra careful during these Covid times (we still are), with a toddler at home we just didn’t want to take any chances. This obviously had its pitfalls. We have been living in a bubble and tolerating each other’s nakhras and more and are still able to happily see each other’s faces. The worst hit in this decision of ours, according to me, is our son (though he still has no clue about it). He has been inside the house since this all started and only outings for him have been going to doctor’s place to get him a big fat injection and making him cry for no fault of his. It is difficult for him a visualise a  world outside the house. As we slowly started taking him out to parks and temples (this happened 2-3 times in these 2 years) he couldn’t enjoy them at first. They seemed scary and absurd to him. We had to reassure him many a times that this was all normal and actually super fun.

Today was one such day. We had taken him to the park. This was his second visit to the park. A very normal and an everyday place for kids of this age, but to him this was all still new. Though now he had also learnt about it as a part of his e-learning exercise and had had fun doing that. This brought in some excitement to the trip and some familiarity in his case. He still was very cautious and didn’t try anything unless we first sat in it and was continuously reassured that he would be okay.

Though I’m very sure that all this will phase out as time goes but I do keep wondering what impact will it really have on children who are growing up in these times where it’s better not to socialise with people or to interact with them, where it’s proper to not send food to your neighbours, where it’s okay to think only about ourselves. I feel we as adults know that this is not the normal way but I do wonder, if these are the only things my child sees me doing then will he learn otherwise?

Anyways we did real fun at the park today. Tough we did not see anyone else and exited the park right before a few boys came in to play, but still it’s a step towards normalcy for us. We bravely tried in all the rides and played some football too. All in all a day really went spent.

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