So one day on our big Christmas trip to Arkansas to see my wife’s sister’s family, my brother-in-law Phil and I let our wives go shopping while we took the kids to a nice big park overlooking the Arkansas River (right there in Little Rock, real close to the Clinton Presidential Library).

As we were eating our picnic lunch

. . . on top of the interestingly landscaped hill

. . . we saw what seemed (to our Minnesota eyes) to be odd

: families were sledding

. . . down the brown grass, on real sleds and big pieces of cardboard.

. . . so of course we (with our Minnesota sensibilities) chuckled. How can you call it sledding when there’s no snow?

And then we went on a walk. We visited the Arkansas River Nature Center. We found a couple geocaches. And then on the way back to our car . . .

. . our kids found some of the big pieces of cardboard that a family had left . . .

. . . and they did the obvious thing. They sledded down the hill.

. . . and they, of course, had a lot of fun. And then as must happen, and as the sun was going down. . .

I, the Responsible Father, had to try it. It goes without saying that, on my way down, I turned sideways, turned over and got fairly grassy and dirty. But it was fun.

The End

I now leave you . . .

. . . with two artistic photos from that day.

. . . using my definition of ‘artistic’, of course.

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