It’s always a great joy to initiate city people into the wonderful world of donkeys, when it’s your granddaughter, it’s especially sweet. This trip, Robin was ready to meet the donkeys, and she was cautious for about 10 minutes, then fell in love.

Lulu and Fanny are veteran child-charmers, they are sweet, gentle and careful not to move sharply.

We gave her a fistful of alfalfa cubes, and the donkeys took care of the rest, eating them gently and slowly. We showed Robin how to hold the food in the palm of her hand – the parents were only slightly nervous – and within a couple of minutes, Lulu and Fanny were both lined up to get some snacks.

it was a lovely thing for me to see this, a special moment for me, and I think, for Robin and Emma.

This is only the second trip to the farm for Robin, and I doubt there will be many more anytime soon. I’m not entirely in sync with the people who tell me this will be the happiest moment of my life, or that there is nothing like it.

I am very happy Robin is here, and absolutely delighted to spend time with her and I love her wit and attitude and charm. But I can’t say it’s the best experience of my life because that would not be true. And I work very hard these days at speaking the truth.

I’ve always thought Robin and I would connect the most when she is a bit older, and I think that is beginning to happen.  I don’t know where it’s going to go, we live pretty far apart and lead very different and busy lives.

And I have no desire to live in Brooklyn.

But speaking only for me, it would make me sad to think this was the most important experience of my life, she’s only three years old and I have more than a half-century of life behind me. I want to show more for it than just that.

But still,  this was a special moment for me, and I feel it. We are connecting with one another.

I love seeing the farm work its magic, and I feel that Robin, and perhaps Emma as well, are starting to think about who I am.