Unlike all Chloe’s other friends, Jasmine lives less than a five minute walk from our house. When we hear an unexpected knock on the door, we usually conclude it is Jasmine. In this manner, Chloe ends up spending a lot of time with Jasmine. Together Chloe and Jasmine walk into town for simple things like an ice cream or a candy bar. At other times they head off together to see a movie.
Early in the afternoon on Saturday we heard Jasmine’s signature knock on our door and soon she was inside our house plotting fun activities with Chloe. Jasmine had done a bunch of work around the house in exchange for a promise from her mother to buy Jasmine and a friend tickets to see a movie along with some popcorn. So Chloe headed off for the movie with Jasmine, and when they returned they had plans for a special sleepover.
Jasmine had brought a flashlight along. She and Chloe entered our coat closet which is beneath our stairs. To the left of the door, the stairs descend to make that part of the closet too low to stand. With Jasmine’s flashlight on, Chloe and Jasmine went into the coat closet for a secret meeting. When they emerged perhaps an hour later, they explained that they wanted to pile the storage boxes a certain way and sleep in the closet together that night. Amelia and I made them explain a few details but in the end we each gave permission to their sleeping adventure.
After dinner, Chloe and Jasmine returned to the coat closet with Jasmine’s flashlight and closed the door. We couldn’t hear anything but when they emerged perhaps an hour later, the storage boxes were stacked neatly in the back of the closet on one side and the floor of the closet looked like the floor of an elaborate camping tent. For the rest of the evening, Chloe travelled back and forth between watching television together and their secret conference room in the coat closet. In the end, Philip and the adults retired before the girls did. But when we got up in the morning, we could see a through a slightly ajar coat closet door the sleeping figures of Chloe and Jasmine.
I think at some point nearly every child wants to sleep with a friend under a fort or tent made from chairs and blankets. Chloe went through this phase around age eight. Lately, sleepovers have either happened in Chloe’s room or the family room. The coat closet was new. And perhaps it was the novelty—especially when adding Jasmine’s flashlight to the equation—that captured Chloe’s sense of what is fun in response to Jasmine’s idea.
Eventually we had to wake up Chloe and Jasmine and request they get up and clear their sleeping supplies from the coat closet. After breakfast while waiting for Jasmine’s mother, however, the two returned to the coat closet as their secret conference room. The door was only slightly ajar and the flashlight was back on. Only when one got right up to the door was their whispering detectable but too muffled to comprehend without actually joining them.
I think in the end, it was about doing something fun and different together. For us it was a reminder that little adventures are what make life fun. The two may have spent a lot of money seeing the movie and eating popcorn but I expect the memory they will cherish from this weekend is what cost them nothing: The time they spent in the coat closet.
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