Early morning friends

Calvin has had an adorable habit this year of getting up at the crack of dawn in order to be ready in time to walk his best friend to the bus stop. Aside from the cuteness, there are many hilarious things about this. First, I think I posted a year or two ago, or maybe even both times, about how nice it was to be able to sleep in, especially on winter mornings, instead of having to live on a traditional school schedule. Second, the bus stop is across from our house, so in order to walk her to the bus stop he often actually goes around the corner to meet her at her house first.

No doubt, it's cute.

This morning, as usual, even though it was frigid and snowing like crazy, he was up and out the door at 7:40. He meets his friend and they talk, play, do I-don't-know-what, while waiting for the bus, which comes around 7:50. The bus stop is right outside our door, and his friend usually has a parent there in addition to other parents there on foot or in cars, and now that it's cold I usually shut the door firmly behind him and go back to my coffee until he returns and we start school. This morning, though, I looked up from my crossword to find that it was already 8:00 and no kid. Jon and I both yelled upstairs—had we missed him? Nope, nowhere in the house. I looked out front—everyone was gone from the corner. In the moment before actual panic set in I quickly scanned the whitened neighborhood for signs in the snow, and there he was.

He had shoveled our driveway.