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With various social work trundled along its merry way, Astrid is formally adopted as Astrid Irene Adams, declared to be four years old with a birthday on March 30 for paperwork purposes, and successfully passed off as human to all prying eyes.
She grows and falls over a lot and maintains her orange coiffure and reads books and is generally precocious. The veganism and the aversion to salt and lipids persist.
Her fifth basketday approaches.
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bulrushes
asmyown
"Well, I imagine it used to be, a very long time ago. But now we humans have neatly sorted things into 'food' and 'not food' categories, so if I didn't know if something were edible I could check with someone else."
asmyown
"There are ways to test it - smelling and tasting before actually eating, rubbing a bit on your skin to see if it reacts badly, that sort of thing. But for every edible food, I imagine that there was at least one soul who said, 'I don't know what this is, but I'm going to try to eat it.'"
asmyown
Lynn starts looking for places that Astrid can go swimming in privacy, considering its necessity. She considers the ocean, but the openness of that option makes her nervous. A proper pool does the same, so she looks into other options. Eventually, after some work and a large amount of time, she finds an out of the way pond that is open to swimmers, but not visited often. Especially early in the morning.
"Astrid," she says, one day. "Do you want to go swimming? I found a place, if you'd like to."
asmyown
"All right."
A few days later, Astrid is equipped with a towel and a swimsuit (that she picked out, Lynn has little to no taste for fashion) and brought to the pond to try out swimming. Lynn is similarly dressed.
"Any 'do not touch' coming from the pond?" she asks her daughter. She's learned by now to just - accept the weirdness.
A few days later, Astrid is equipped with a towel and a swimsuit (that she picked out, Lynn has little to no taste for fashion) and brought to the pond to try out swimming. Lynn is similarly dressed.
"Any 'do not touch' coming from the pond?" she asks her daughter. She's learned by now to just - accept the weirdness.
bulrushes
"No, the pond is fine. It's just water and stuff."
To the water she goes. She wades in, untroubled by the cold water.
To the water she goes. She wades in, untroubled by the cold water.
asmyown
Lynn follows, making a face at the water's temperature but otherwise not reacting.
"Humans don't start out with the ability to swim automatically. So just because you can't immediately might not mean you will never be able to."
"Humans don't start out with the ability to swim automatically. So just because you can't immediately might not mean you will never be able to."
asmyown
"I'll show by example, then we'll work on you doing it," says Lynn. And then she demonstrates, using different methods with a few explanations of the strengths and weaknesses of each. Stroke, stroke, stroke. One lap around the little pond, then it's back to Astrid.
"What we're going to do first is see if you can float on your back. Sounds good?"
"What we're going to do first is see if you can float on your back. Sounds good?"
asmyown
"Then I will be right here, and I will make sure that you don't sink. I promise I'll do everything I can to make sure nothing happens to you."
asmyown
"It helps if you take a deep breath, but it's the sort of thing that is - hard to explain."
bulrushes
Astrid takes a deep breath. She sits down on the bottom of the shallow pond end, and attempts to lean back onto the water.
asmyown
Lynn moves beside her, to help if there's any sign of panic or if there's something she can correct. Right now, though, she's rather proud of her daughter for being brave.
bulrushes
Astrid isn't panicking, but she's not mastering floating either. It doesn't seem to be a buoyancy problem, just a skill problem. She goes on holding her breath when her head dunks underwater and comes up with her hair plastered over her face.
asmyown
Aha, this is a problem Lynn can help with.
She carefully corrects some of the obvious skill mistakes, and says reassuringly, "You can float already, see?"
She carefully corrects some of the obvious skill mistakes, and says reassuringly, "You can float already, see?"
asmyown
"You are a floating thing!" agrees Lynn, grinning. "If you like swimming then we can try the public pool or the ocean, or we can stick to this pond. Essentially, if you enjoy it I will work to find ways you can do it."