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The hinterlands of Southwest Ontatio
July 2007

Before we begin: This photo supports our weekly Thematic Photographic theme. This time out, we're focusing on "broken" and I hope you'll participate in this, too. Head over here to share your broken perspective - after you've left your caption, of course :)

The scene: July 8, 2007, 10:06 p.m. in a McDonald's at a rest stop beside the 401. We've just dropped Debbie off at the airport and are making the two-hour trip back home (thanks, Air Canada, for making it so convenient to fly out of our own city.) The kids aren't happy. They already miss their mom. But she's flying to Montreal to be with her hospitalized mother. Sometimes, life's just like that, and they're learning all too young that things aren't always fair.

Little man is especially sad. As the golden arches glow warmly in the distance, I ask if they'd like to stop for ice cream. Oldest parenting trick in the book, I know, and really cheesy to boot. But if it dries his tears on this night, I'll do whatever it takes.

Three soft vanilla ice creams later, we're sitting in the mostly empty restaurant, looking for happy things to divert our attention. We talk about the dog, whose nub of a tail will wag at light-speed as we pull into the driveway. We mull over what movie to watch for the rest of the ride home. We laugh at how Noah managed to cover half his face with ice cream.

It's a quiet moment at a time when the world around them is anything but, so we linger a little to make it last just a little longer. It meant a later bedtime by the time we got back to London, but it was worth the detour.

Your turn: I took this photo just before we headed out to the parking lot. Our daughter thought it was so sad that all the garbage was overflowing, and there was nary a recycling bin in sight. How right she was. In retrospect, this is a photo that just begs for a caption. Can you come up with one? Please click the Comment link and give me your best. I'll name the winner next Sunday. For more details on how Caption This, my weekly photo caption challenge, works, just click here.

About last week's photo of birds on a hot tin roof: This is one of my favorite photos from a memorable family day at the beach. As the snow gets deeper and the windows slowly glaze over, memories of experiences like this loom large for me. Thanks for coming along for the ride. This week's honorable menschens are:

• Dana: "Little minds think alike."
• Salubrina: "To line up, or not to line up."
• Barb: "Tenhut! About face!"
• John: "Beethoven said if we sat in exactly THIS pattern, he would make us into musical notes in his next symphony...what's a symphony?"
• Terri: ""Alfred Hitchcock Presents."
• Linda: "Climbing the bird ladder of success."

And our winner? Hilary's Gulls just wanna have fun made me laugh out loud. I've always admired Cyndi Lauper for being her own person no matter what anyone else has said, so this one played on a number of levels for me. She's a fellow Ontarian, and her blog, The Smitten Image, is nothing short of a great read. You owe it to yourself to pay her a visit.