Photo from later that afternoon, after his big brother’s game.

Saturday late brunch at IHOP.

To our right: two grandmothers, possibly even great grandmothers–they were clearly too old to in any way be the mother of the six or seven year old girl with them, who had a nice dress on.

When there are two grownups talking and you’ve eaten your food and they’re not done, it gets boring fast for a kid. She was trying very hard to be good on her special outing, though.

We were hoping to get the littler ones fed and done in not too much time ourselves with a busy day ahead.

Peruvian handknit finger puppets for the grandkids, three more for those women and their child and you should have seen their faces light up. They so much gave me what I hope for when I offer those to strangers for their kids.

There had just been no way I was going to leave that little girl out when my own had theirs to play with. A pink bird to go with her dress, after getting their okay, I had just the right one for her.

But it wasn’t enough distraction for one little guy: Spencer had had a bad night and his morning wasn’t going much better.  He wanted–he didn’t know what he wanted or how to begin to say whatever the words were to describe it but he was determined to announce he didn’t have it. Crayons, paper, food, everything got that emphatic arm sweeping with fingers splayed that small toddlers do to send stuff to the floor.

Except that, at the big table past ours, there was a family reunion going on, about ten people all in their 50s and 60s, and they were swapping stories and do-you-remember-whens, laughing, laughing, laughing: so much love at that table that just echoed around our section of the restaurant.

He started to pay attention.

Finally, Kim headed out with the kids; since we didn’t all fit in one car, Richard and Richard and I took a moment more to finish up, and then it was time for us to go, too.

But standing up and taking the first few steps away, I hesitated.

I managed to catch the eye of one of the women, and then they all turned to me a moment, love and curiosity just radiant in their faces.

I told that beautiful African-American family, You guys are SO happy, and you made our tired, cranky baby happy. Thank you!

That just totally made their day.

Like they had made ours.