March 10th

Fourteen years ago, having foolishly become pregnant with my second child, I went ahead & had it.

"It" became a "him".

He was a hefty brute, over 9 1/2 lbs!  He presided over the hospital nursery as its rightful king, being almost double the weight of several of his cohorts.  "He's a tank baby compared to the others!", the nurse exclaimed.

He was obviously the best one, so I took him home.

We have not been sorry, for the most part ;).

From the beginning he was an 'outside of the box' fellow.  I could not carry him like most people carried their older babies - kind of sitting in one arm with the babies arms & legs wrapped around you like a koala bear.  Because it didn't seem to occur to him that he had to hold on.  So if I held him like that & then I suddenly turned around, his arms would release & his body would just sway out into space with his arms flapping like wings, while I would only have a grip on his bottom & his legs.  He didn't seem to mind, but it was sort of unnerving for me, so he spent those early years being carried about tucked under my arm like a football instead.

He loved wearing grown-ups shoes on his hands while he crawled, so visitors would have to search the house for their shoes when they were ready to leave.

He loved to climb, so for an entire year we had to quickly whisk the dinning room chairs up onto the table whenever we were finished eating.

Early on his older brother (by 20 months) found a specific use for him - as a bolster.  My older son would position the baby on his stomach & then either use his back as a pillow, or lie on his stomach across the baby while reading a book.  My little one didn't care about that either & was just as happy in those times as he ever was.


Here are some excerpts from my Christmas letters over the years:
2001 -
...My 3 year old son has a baby of his own now.  He found her on a walk around the neighborhood.  She is a trailer hitch.  She is silver & is quite heavy.  She sleeps in a cardboard box in my son's room, under a washcloth blanket.  "Her name is Fanwa." my son gravely informed me, "She was hit by a car."  Apparently she is in a coma, which would explain why she is such a maintenance-free baby.  Due to her weight, she is not allowed in any uncarpeted rooms...

2003 -
...Kindergarten this year.  My son is learning many new things, but if you were to ask him, he would tell you that time spent at school is just killing time 'til he can go home & play Army Men or Transformers.  To him, teacher's assignments are mere suggestions that he condescends to fulfil, with a heavy sigh (after all, he added 5+4 yesterday, why must he do it again today?)...

2005 -
...This fall, when it was time for class pictures, my son's teacher told everyone they must stand up to see who was tallest so they could line up tallest to shortest to go get the pictures taken.  Everyone was standing up measuring each other when his teacher noticed my son was still sitting down.  She asked him, "Why aren't you standing up?".  "Why bother," he said morosely, "Just put me at the end of the line."  & sure enough, he is still the shortest kid in the 2nd grade...

2007 -
...My son is trying to make it thru the 4th grade without using multiplication - I flipped over a math paper that had 16X22 as a math problem & there on the back were sixteen 22's, all lined up & ready to add.  "I like to add," is his explanation.  I'm telling you, there are not many things as interesting as going thru his school work each week.  In fact, some of his responses to questions have achieved legendary status.  Who can forget this math question, for example:  Ron has $15.00.  He gives $2.50 to Rita.  He goes to the store to buy candy.  How many 75 cent pieces can he buy?  The answer, according to my genius child, is "Wednesday"...

2009 -
...Yesterday, my 6th grader set up my Christmas Village under the tree, as has been our tradition.  He brought me over to point out the ponds, the skaters, the dead guy, the skiers, the trees, the - wait a minute, what DEAD guy?  Son, why is there a dead guy? 
"Well," he explains, "That's the guy with the broken ski, remember, so he crashed & now he's dead." 
Well, I don't think the people of the Village would just leave him lying there, would they, frozen in the snow? 
"No, of course not!", he points, "See there?  There is the doctor coming to help him." 
Oh, you mean the old man who usually rides in the sleigh with the old lady?  But, why are all those reindeer surrounding his sled? 
"They're attacking the doctor - they are killer reindeer." 
Hmmm, nice...& this reindeer in the tree? 
"Ah, that's from when Santa's sleigh was shot down." 
Of course.  & the old lady?  Why is she sitting on top of the outhouse? 
"She is the sniper." 
Okay, I don't think I can bear to know any more...

2011 -
...Then there's my youngest son in 8th grade.  At school conferences, when the teachers see me coming, they smile, shaking their heads, as they mutter my sons name three times in a downward sigh, apparently at a total loss for whatever words might follow this declaration.  While the teachers may be at a loss for words, my son certainly is not.  At almost 14, he still thinks of school as an insane asylum, where teachers cause their inmates to slowly waste away of boredom in between assigning useless projects & tests on all manner of things that can't possibly have any application to real life... 

Happy 14th Birthday Son!!!
- on with your REAL life!

& thank YOU for being at part of MY real life!  I wouldn't change a thing...;)