As our young son Henry gets older his thirst to explore the neighborhood with his little friends becomes stronger.

I just don’t think he’s ready (will I ever be, I wonder?) because really he’s just started getting good at crossing the street.

I still don’t like to see him do it alone. I tag along behind him while he’s riding his scooter to visit the neighbor’s little dog in the alley.

I tag along while he goes to visit a new friend one street over.

I will keep tagging along until I think he’s ready, I think.

For now, it’s good exercise for me, chasing after him a bit. I might think differently when it’s 90 degrees out this summer, but then again that’s another good reason to have a little backyard pool.

All the kids want to come and swim at our house — that’s less chasing for me!

On a side note, we had a visitor of the furry kind this evening. A cute calico-looking kitty who appears to be pretty young.

I’m a sucker for stray cats.

She (or he) looked kind of skinny so I asked my husband to get a piece of chicken leftover from dinner to give her.

She just licked it at first, but seemed to want to dig in.

So we left her to eat in peace. She might be gone tomorrow or she might be meowing for more. We’ll see.

There are local organizations that help stray cats so if we can reach her maybe we can get her some help.

If I had my way I’d probably have at least two cats as pets in the house, but my hubby is very allergic to them and I have a little allergy as well — but not enough to keep me away from the kitties.

Uh oh, I’m already thinking of names for this cat. I might be in trouble.

Hanson can be reached at shanson@timesleaderonline.com.