Madeleine

Madeleine contemplates giving her sandwich to the goldfish, which receives a stern look from yours truly. She desists. This morning the kid has three hours of performance class which, she tells me, includes "singing, dancing and some acting" which I imagine she is pretty good at. Performance class has replaced football on Saturday mornings - unfortunately, girls have a limited choice of teams or leagues for their advancement. While soccer the national pastime, it is a boys game in the UK (by far the most popular girls sport here is netball, which started in England and sort of like basketball). At some point Madeleine lost interest, despite being one of the fastest kids at Palewell Park. She still has swim-team so sports not over by a long shot while we have yet to find that one thing Madeleine wants to do more than anything else. For now, it is Tommy or arts and crafts or playing with some creature she has found in the pond. She loves to disappear into her imagination and can spend the day re-arranging her bedroom toys. I remind myself: no rush.