Maybelle had never ridden a Charleston "bus-trolley" (as the kids called it) before, and this is how she felt about it. Bus-trolley = big life event.
She told me ahead of time that the thing she wanted to see was starfish, and there were a couple in this touch tank. I managed to get a picture of her looking interested, but she actually wasn't. She made no effort to touch any of the fish or crabs in the touch tank, even though she was allowed to.
I kept taking pictures, and she wanted in on the action. She loves a self-portrait
Okay, so this really was her favorite thing at the aquarium: it's this big tank of silver fish. There is one huge, huge tank in the middle of the aquarium--it has an assortment of amazing fish that are as big as the kids in Maybelle's class, sharks, sea turtles, etc--but she didn't care for that. This tank, though, she loved. The fish were all the same kind, and all shining silver. The tank had a current, so they were all swimming together. If you bumped the tank, or waved your hand quickly in front of it, they'd change directions all together. The school of fish is a pretty cool thing. She stood there and watched it quite a while, until we had to move along with the rest of the kids from her class.
What kind of fish are they? You know, it would have been good for me to look and make this an educational moment, but I didn't.
And as the morning at the aquarium ended, I saw more and more of this scenario. Here's the conversation that accompanies this picture:
Maybelle: "Carry you!"
Alison: "Full sentence, please."
Maybelle: "I want carry you, please."
Maybelle wasn't the only exhausted kid--they were all either giddy or silent on the bus ride back to school. All in all, a very good field trip.
Maybelle at the aquarium! What great pictures. Did the silver fish have a bulge on the top of their heads? There is a something jack (maybe even a silver jack?) that swims in schools at the aquarium.....although I have not been there in years.
ReplyDeleteI'm with Maybelle on the touch tank stuff. Never liked that. And I love that circular fish thingy -- are they perhaps anchovies? Anyway, we have one at the Long Beach Aquarium, and there's something so spectacularly orderly about it. Great photos of the girl -- she's just so damn cute.
ReplyDelete"Spectacularly orderly"--that's a great way of saying it, Elizabeth. And thanks for recognizing Maybelle's cuteness!
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