<p>If you overlook the 6-year-old demonstrating her best soccer kick, whereupon her shoe flew off her foot and grazed the side of my head, we had a good visit with two of the grands.</p>
<p>When our son and his wife, who live in a two-bedroom apartment in Chicago, had their fourth child (family motto: “Stack ’em high and stack ’em deep”), we drove up, admired the new baby, and then brought the 6- and the 4-year-old home with us for 10 days. Make that 10 days and six hours, but who’s counting?</p>
<p>Occasionally on long drives, I sometimes grow drowsy, but this was not even a remote possibility with our inquisitive passengers in the car.</p>
<p>“Where does gasoline come from, Grandma?”</p>
<p>“What’s the difference between a golfer and a gopher, Grandpa?”</p>
<p>I would have said the difference between a golfer and a gopher is an “l” and a “p,” but their grandpa is more patient than their grandma.</p>
<p>“What exactly is quicksand?”</p>
<p>They had a steady barrage of questions that could have kept the Google search engine busy for hours.</p>
<p>“What if hail comes down on your house?”</p>
<p>It was like a game show with only seconds to answer before another question was fired.</p>
<p>“How do the police catch bad guys?”</p>
<p>“You’re good conversationalists,” I told the kids. “Do you know what that means?”</p>
<p>“Yes, it means we’re good talkers.”</p>
<p>The good talkers came with, shall we say, an intensity.</p>
<p>“It’s going well,” I told a friend on Day 4. “Although it is a bit of a jolt to our systems.”</p>
<p>Two days later I considered instituting naptime. For the adults.</p>
<p>They were only small differences really. We gravitate toward conversational tones; the children were propelled by sudden bursts of shrieking and laughing. I’ve always liked the piano on the west wall where it has stood for 20 years; they moved it perpendicular to the wall to create a fort.</p>
<p>“How is it going?” our son asked by phone.</p>
<p>“They’re angelic,” I said. (When they are sleeping.)</p>
<p>“Are they behaving?” he asked.</p>
<p>“Oh my, yes.” (Do not get out of that chair until I say you can!)</p>
<p>“Are they eating well?”</p>
<p>“Very well.” (If you count cheese as a food group.)</p>
<p>I was making calzones one afternoon when my garlic disappeared. I entertained the idea that I had finally lost my mind. Still, I looked high and low searching the kitchen and finally asked out loud how a woman loses six garlic bulbs in a mesh tube.</p>
<p>“Were they in that thing that looks like a sock?” one of them asked.</p>
<p>“Yes.”</p>
<p>“I took it upstairs to play with it.”</p>
<p>It was wonderful to have them here for a lengthy stay. We feel like we completed a rigorous physical fitness training. Our reflexes have never been sharper, nor our response times quicker.</p>
<p>We called the day after we delivered them back home and asked how they had adjusted to one another again.</p>
<p>“It was sure quiet when they were gone,” our son said. “It’s great to have them back. It’s just a bit of a jolt.”</p>
<p>We understand.</p>
