(finger painting ... it's about more than fingers)
My 4-year-old granddaughter started preschool this week. Amazing. Some of my first memories are of preschool.
I remember a big red "barn" where the outdoor toys were kept. If I hurried outside at recess time, I could get the tricycle before anybody else grabbed it.
I remember the swings, where I could have happily spent an entire day. My teacher told my mom I was amazingly good at "pumping" for my age. This was my first and last athletic accomplishment.
I remember finger painting, with the squishy paint covering my hands. It smelled great. The best part of finger painting was, there was no wrong way to do it. You could work really hard to make a painting that looked like something. Or you could just enjoy the smell, the feel, the fun of smearing gooey paint over the slick paper, making rainbows that blended into houses that smeared up against clouds that looked like nothing in the real world but felt like a brave, brand new world you had created all by your little 4-year-old self.
That's all I remember. But it's enough. It was a good start.
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