When I was a kid, my sister and her best friend used to speak a secret language, sort of like Pig Latin, but different. I remember it frustrated the hell out of me to not know what they were talking about. Well, eventually they taught me, and when my sister and I spent part of the summers in Mississippi with our childhood friend April and her siblings, we taught April the secret language as well. So every summer the three of us practiced, and we got pretty good at it. Several years later, when April and I started working at summer camp together, we continued to talk in the secret language, which came in really handy for personal matters and inside jokes we wanted to keep from the campers and other staff.

Anyway, I guess the last time I spoke it was fifteen years ago.

Today I drove to San Antonio to see April and meet her three children for the first time. Bonnie let me borrow her convertible, and I drove with the top down half the way there, which was apparently enough time to sunburn my arms and face. Oh well. When I got to April’s, I met her two girls, Ella and Istra, but her son, Phoenix, was busy playing inside a blanket fort. However, before long, we all piled into the car and headed downtown to eat a restaurant called La Gloria.

So get this. While we were all still in the car, April started talking in the secret language so the kids wouldn’t understand her. And here’s the cool thing–even though I had to ask her to slow down and repeat a couple of things (which I said IN the secret language), I actually understood what she was saying. And since I spoke it, I obviously remembered how it worked. Maybe not quite like riding a bicycle, but close. It came back–just a little wobbly.

At the restaurant we sat outside, and when they weren’t eating, April’s kids explored the adjacent park together. Every few minutes they’d come back, check in, get a hug from April. I thought the oldest, Ella, looked a lot like April and he sister when they were young, and Phoenix reminded me of April’s youngest brother. Anyway, it was the weirdest thing seeing them eating and playing games together, since I remember being their age and doing those same things with their mom.

When we finished eating we walked along the Riverwalk, which was a first for me. We started off in the new section, and when the kids got tired, we boarded a water taxi (a boat) that took us to the old section, the one that everyone is probably talking about when referring to the Riverwalk. Along the way Ella told several jokes, like, “What do you call a crate full of ducks?”

A box of quackers!

I said, “What do you call a cow with three legs?”  Eileen. But Ella said she didn’t get it, so April had to explain. (It’s never funny when you have to explain, especially if you’re nine.)

When we arrived at the main section of the Riverwalk, we got off the taxi and walked to the Alamo. (Remember the Alamo?) April pointed out that on one side of the street was the site of a historic battle, and on the other side of the street was Ripley’s Believe It or Not (believe it or not).

I guess time changes everything.

Next we hung out in the lobby of the Emily Morgan Hotel. April said this was a good way to sit down, chill out, and entertain children for free. Well, up until this point, Phoenix had been shy to warm up to me. But I guess he figured I was okay, and after I picked up WAY up in the air, he kept wanting to “do it again, do it again.” But instead of my just picking him up, he’d put his feet against me and run up my chest and shoulders like gravity or my discomfort didn’t matter.

Because they didn’t.

Eventually we made our way back to the Riverwalk, grabbed another taxi to head back to where we started, and I got shit on by a bird. You read that right. I was just sitting there, minding my own business, and I felt what I assumed was a splash of water on my legs, figuring it came from the river or maybe the tree above us. But then I something more than water on my leg–something of, shall we say, substance. And get this. Before I could even ask, April said, “I’m not one of those moms who carries napkins or wet wipes.”

I looked at the shit on my thigh. “How is that not a requirement for parenthood?”

One of the things I told April today is that sometimes I forget that I had a life before I became an adult, that I used to play in the mud, tell knock-knock jokes, and get piggy back rides instead of give them. I look at April’s kids, and it seems like so much time has passed. I guess because it has. But then–just like that–I was speaking that secret language again, letting kids climb all over me as if I’m a jungle gym, like I used to do at summer camp, and it felt like no time had passed at all.

One of my favorite quotes by Joseph Campbell says, “As you proceed through life, following your own path, birds will shit on you. Don’t bother to brush it off.” What I love about this idea is that–obviously–there are a lot of things we can’t do anything about. But so often we get hung up on–well–shit we can’t change, stuff that comes with the territory of being human. And this is where I think kids really have it made over adults–they live more in the present. If a bird shits on them, they’re not complaining about it two hours, let alone, two years later. What’s more, they’re more likely to see “something awful” as “something interesting,” as evidenced today when Phoenix pulled his bare feet out of his rubber boots, smelled his toes, and smiled.

Of course, none of us can stop our physical bodies from growing old. In that respect, time really does change everything. From day one, our bodies weren’t made to last. Our spirits, however, are a different matter, and we don’t have to grow old internally if we don’t want to. Rather, we can make it a point to stay curious and full of wonder, laugh and cry when it’s honest to do so, and not worry so much about all that shit we can’t do anything about, all that shit that is ultimately–part of life.