Published: June 1, 2017 By

Eric Gershon

It was a Sunday morning in April, sunny, not quite warm. I was casting about for an adventure for myself and my daughter Waverly, now almost two.

Might CU’s Museum of Natural History be open? Indeed, 10 to 4!

Off to campus we zoomed in our bright orange Subaru.

We parked at the alumni center, marched up Broadway, then weaved southeasterly past campus cottages, brooks and bicycle racks.

Beneath the climbing sun, remnant snowfall vanished into crackling earth. There was no one around.

By the museum entrance we paused to soak in the silence of the adjacent amphitheater, vacant. We bathed in sunshine amid dripping snowmelt.

Then we communed with fossil forms and butterfly wings.

Waverly patted petrified wood. I photographed her beside a Triceratops skull. She beheld a scarlet macaw. All for the first time.

What a place to be a child this university is! Or a full-grown adult.