Max In The Present, Past and Future

It was Christmas Eve and Max was in the midst of his first thousand steps. Each and every step was still a big deal. All the relatives would call Max and hope that he would walk towards them which he did for awhile until he got sick of being called. He stopped walking and began to crawl.

His father said "let him go where he wants to go."

Everybody was watching but nobody was calling. After a few stepless moments, everybody started turning their attention to other  conversations and left Max alone.

The most  consecutive steps Max had taken in his life was maybe four or five before he fell Kaboom to his padded keister. Every step greeted with "Look at Max walk."

After the stillness, only I and his Dad were sustaing our attention.

"He'll walk when he wants to walk and he'll go where he wants to go." said his Dad.

"That's the way we all like to go." I agreed.

All at once Max got to his feet. He had a destination.

He took one step, two steps, three steps, four steps, five steps, six, seven, eight.......

"There he goes" said his Dad.

"Yup" said I.

Max was heading towards a cooler that I hadn't noticed.

He took a few more steps and reached his destination. Still standing, he reached the cooler and put his hands upon it for balance.

I picked up my camera.

Max started pulling at the top of the cooler. His big blue eyes, a study in determination. I got a new angle, just in case.

Sure enough, he started opening the cooler.

His Dad said, "Max get me a beer."

He opened the cooler.

It looked as if he were going to reach in and the expression on his face seemed as if he was responding to his Dad and asking "whaddya want Dad, a Mick Light?"

I snapped the camera. This wasn't a dream.

The camera clicked. The flash fired.

Max dropped the lid. He lost his balance. He fell on his rear and made his way back to his Dad.

"Didja get that shot/" Dad asked.

"I think I did."

Turns out that I did.

It was a moment that we'd be talking about for a long time as if we could see the future and we had captured it forever.