Melanie Hamilton rides again

I’ve probably mentioned it before but one of my favorite quotes is the one out of Melanie Hamilton’s mouth when she opines, “The happiest days are when babies come.”

Talking to our Friend Liz last night we learned that it’s another happy day. Her little daughter arrived safely this week making them a family of four in the process.

I wish a lot of things for little Miss Zeina but especially that she will have her mother’s intelligence and her mother’s wildchild streak of daring– Liz would do just about anything to prove that she could. That’s not a bad trait in a world that still says, “No, you can’t do that. You shouldn’t even try.” Superficially I want her to have her Mommy’s hair, too– a riotous mass of perfect curls.

From her Dad I hope she gets his earnest way of listening– you never feel as though he is distracted when he’s talking to you. Or listening to you. That’s a rare trait.

Both of her parents have great senses of humor and are well traveled– making them, in my book, good parents for that alone.

And Miss Z is lucky to have a big brother who is easy going and seemingly always smiling.

Keep your eye on this one. She’s going to do amazing things.

Middling

One of the recent surprises in getting older is suddenly being the middle generation at family reunions/events. It should have occured to me when my nieces came into the picture but it didn’t. And, in the 22 months of Jack, it hasn’t crossed my mind either.

In a 36 hour span this week it did. First my “little” cousin Sorelle was feted for a bridal (and groomal) shower. Talking to Sorelle– who we all grew up with as “Roo” about marriage and in-laws I was aware of the knee-high swarm of little people around us. My son, her nieces, our first-cousins-once-removed happily played in the afternoon heat the way we used to. (Another sign of older age– finally getting that first cousins removed and second cousins thing down.)

And then, yesterday, another “little” cousin gave birth to her firstborn. Miss Olivia has joined the family and, with her birth, sealed off our little knot of cousins and sisters from being the younger generation.

Today, in the car running errands, my youngest niece and I had a conversation about the downside to being a kid. We agreed that it’s great not having to worry about mortgages, car payments, bills, and the like. But it’s also not so great to have to always be respectful to adults even when they sometimes act jerky.

So I’m not sad that I’m definitely, definitively, catergorically NOT in the youngest generation but I do kind of wish I could stop time for a while to enjoy being in the middle.

Come Ride with We

We’ve fallen off the proverbial bicycle.

Somewhere, in our third decade we quit riding our bikes and forgot how nice the breeze is in your hair when you create the breeze on a good, long hill. Wait. I know exactly when we fell off. Three summers ago. When I was expecting Jack. Bumps belong under a bike wheel on a pot rutted street. Not on top of a teeny little bike wheel. I spared Jack that and we did our joy riding from the passenger seat of the SUV.

Last summer it seemed impossible. But this year the light bulb went off and we went off in search of a bike trailer. It’s been a good addition to the Jack Pile O’ Stuff. Jack seems to like his new wheels– from his little mesh kingdom he cackles with glee when he’s not putting the poor little black dog in a head lock of shared joy.

Robby doesn’t mind the added pull on his bike which gives me the freedom to coast along solo… behind the trailer so that my body will be the human air bag should somebody rearend us.

That is, assuming that our heads don’t impode from the lack of protective helmeting on them. Jack’s little melon is protected with a nifty blue helmet that he picked out. He loves it. I’m tempted to put him on it at first light in the morning the way he barrels through life. But then I think of the old Mike Myers skit on Saturday Night Live when he played a kid whose mommy would leash him to the monkey bars in his protective headgear because, “Mommy says I’m hyperactive.” and I don’t.

He’s cute in it. Now that Lance is out of the picture maybe we’ll take our little team on the road.

That, of course, is completely dependent on my feeling my behind again. Yowch. You’d think that the extra padding the years have added would be kind. Again. Yowch.

“Hold, please, for Mensa”

In the phenom studded world of our Jack Rabbit there’s a new soundbite. Our little genius can count to 10. Well. Not exactly. If you start at seven he can. It’s the weirdest thing. I’ll say, “One… Two…” and get nothing. Not even “Three…” warrants much interest on his part– unless he’s got one of my hands and one of Daddy’s because on “three!” we swing him up into the air. “Four, Five, Six” are ignored completely. A little odd because about two months ago at a staff meeting at work he sat in the corner with the little sponge letters from the art room saying, “Six! Six! Six! Six!” over and over. (Try explaining THAT to your coworkers. Try getting them to believe the truth– that his little Elmo phone has numbers AND pictures on the buttons and that he’s partial to the little shoe pictured on the number 6. “Suuuurrre Terri.” Sure Terri you’re darn right! The little Elmo phone doesn’t ever make an appearance at work during our meetings because it makes noise and we don’t bring noisy toys in… oh never mind. You won’t believe me either.) By the time I say, “Seven…” he’s perked up and then, with little fan fare, he’ll say, “Eight. Nine. Ten.”

We don’t know where it came from. I shot down my Mom’s theory– that I counted at him when I was angry or he needed to listen. I tried that once. Once. I got to “Two” and realized that my counting probably wasn’t going to have the desired effect. What was 10 after all? I laughed at myself and gave up.

Robby’s sure it comes from Sesame Street. And he may be on to something– they count on Sesame Street. The Count counts on Sesame Street… but then where are the first 7 numbers in my little Mensa candidate’s repetoire?

I wonder if he’s planning for his future? Maybe he’s holding out for a bigger allowance? Going right for the high numbers?

It’s been so hot this past week. Our wooden deck bakes in the sun. The other day we were scooting out to the car where Jack’s shoes were left on an earlier errand. He darted out past me on to the hot deck where, as I scooped him up, he said earnestly, “Hot!”

Using a word in context. It’s big stuff around here.

We’ll give that a (8, 9,) 10.

Black and Blue and Loved

I’m getting to be one big bruise.

Jack hurtles himself into my legs, my arms, my any-side-he-can-reach. It’s endearing– he can be very sweet when he wraps those arms around in his imitation of a bear hug. But I’ve got the bruises to map his exuberance.

I’ll take them with the c-section scar. Badges of honor.

Reason #6 that M. Night will never hire me on his crew

Is it just me? Am I the only one? Everytime I hear the commercial for M. Night Shamalamadingdang’s new movie, Lady in the Water… when Bryce Dallas Howard (too much information from Opie and the Mrs.) anguishedly cries, “Cleveland, Ruuuuuunnnnn” I really hear her anguishedly cry, “Cleveland Rrrrrrocks!”

Is it just me? Am I the only one?

Filling the void

One of my coworker pal’s sister is visiting from New York. I met her and her husband today and chatted with them about our recent visit to New York City. They live “outside of the city” but have worked and played there. I related our itenerary to them, including our notes for a Future Visit With Only Grown-Ups and exchanged agreements that Central Park is a wonderful place.

And then the Former World Trade Center Site came up.

The husband of coworker’s sister works quite near there and he wondered if we had ventured far enough downtown to see the area. I explained that we had– and that it had been one of the places we’d hoped to see on our too brief visit. Like my coworker, the sister was blunt and came right to the point asking me what was it that had drawn us there… It’s hard now to convey her tone but there was, somewhere in the polite inquisition, the question of what had we come to see? And why.

In hindsight, it was one of the most memorable of our NYC moments. I hope that I will not forget the glee Jack found in running in Central Park’s green, green grass (especially that particular patch that was forbidden) or his surprise in the cold spray of the little children’s fountain and knowing me I’ll tuck carefully away the exact taste of the most wonderful street vendor hotdog… But there was a perfect storm of traveling luck when we viewed the WTC site. It was late at night– we walked from the water and the Staten Island Ferry dock uptown toward it along the ticker-tape-parade route reading the brass plaques set into the pavement along the way. The sky opened up– and really, even from our midwestern “Gosh! This sure is a big city” perspective there was suddenly too much sky all at once. All around there had been this crush of skyscraping buildings so the sudden void was immediate and profound. The site itself is sanitized now, of course, and is surrounded by a chain link fence. But it’s there just the same. An enormous hole that goes down deep into the ground where– at the late hour we visited– construction vehicles sat ready for the next day’s work. Maybe a dozen or so other people were there at the same time– everyone hushed and polite. Jack was asleep in his stroller with Robby pushing somewhere behind me while we read the signs at our own pace. There’s a timeline of the day. And photographs of rescue workers with bloodied office people. They’re captioned photographs and from them we knew that most of the firemen and rescue people pictured were killed in the collapse of the towers when they returned to help more people.

It’s a big, big void that takes up a lot of space. Too big, really, to wrap your brain around. And it’s so familiar after all the news coverage and printed photos– the little park with the statue of the businessman is almost strange to see with green grass and none of the debris.

Our timing was perfect. We’d rearranged our morning itenerary completely– without meaning to– because we’d intended to visit in the early afternoon. This was so much better. It was better for it to be quiet and still and sparsely populated. There’s nothing wrong with tour buses or groups– they’re the same as we except that there’s more of them– but it’s like visiting a great cathedral when there is someone there praying– it feels intrusive and inappropriate. And I think it must be a different place during the day when the buildings around the perimeter are busy and full with streets full of traffic and those construction vehicles constructing.

Coworker’s sister waited for my answer. Coworker’s sister’s husband said, “Honey– it’s a pilgrimage.” And it is maybe. More so– and this is what I tried to explain– it’s our’s too. I watched the Today show that morning when everything changed. On September 11 and September 12 and September 13 we didn’t know what it meant. Were we or some closer landmark next? Would the Empire State Building fall? Would the Statue of Liberty sink into the harbor? Would it be familiar Chicago? or the Golden Gate Bridge?

I did not grieve the loss of any friends or family or home — and I think that’s mostly where coworker’s sister was coming from. And I think I was gentle when I explained that just as I cannot imagine what it must have been like that week to realize a friend and then another and another was dead– she can’t imagine what it was like to be in the rest of the country watching and waiting and grieving too. Our workplace, at the time, was pretty fractured and yet that Tuesday we piled around a small television with rabbit ears and cried together.

“But why go there now? There’s nothing there,” she prodded.

Maybe it’s the Museum in me but it was important for me — and Robby– to see it before it is the next thing. Before the monuments go up or the buildings are erected. While it is still just a huge mark of what was there once.

She looked at me like I was crazy.

Jack’s too little, of course, for all of it. And it’s too soon to tell what he’ll know about that day or our visit because too much can happen in the time between him being old enough to understand and now. I hope that it is as ancient sounding as Pearl Harbor or the Kennedy Assassination was to us when we were growing up.

Maybe by then I’ll have a better explanation.

Webster Funk and Jack

My little man of few words is finally starting to get the hang of English. It’s tough when it’s your second language. He speaks fluent baby. Or Mandarin. We aren’t really sure.

Jack babbles all the time… it just doesn’t make sense to us yet. He has a little sing-song monologue when he “reads” his little books (usually upside down); a running commentary when he plays with his toys; a grunting tribal language for the dog’s benefit; and an extremely expression filled manner of “talking” to us.

But very few actual, translatable words.

On his last well baby check up it came up. The good Dr. Tim asked if our boy was saying much. I admitted that most of his words were still those that he’d come out with on the last check up… that he hadn’t added any new ones. I said this, I’m sure, in Canadian– with an upward inflection that translates into American-English as “Please reassure me now that my small son is normal and that this isn’t some red flag issue.” The very good Dr. Tim assured me that Jack is perfectly fine and pointed out the trees for me in the Parent Forest– that Jack understands us perfectly. As if to punctuate this Jack looked up and babbled something in perfect New Guinean dialect and then popped his Nuk back into his mouth.

It’s true. The kid is fluent in Hearing English. If I tell him we have to let the dog inside he runs to the treat jar to get Phibs a Milkbone (and then yells at the dog to “SIT! SIT!” while he throws the biscuit near the poor flinching pup). If I ask Jack if he wants to go for a walk he runs to the backdoor. At the mention of “lunch” or “dinner” he’s halfway to the diningroom yelling, “Numyum!” The mention that it’s time to “brush your teeth” has him rushing to give goodnight kisses on his way to the stairs.

Still. I come from a family of girls. Girls who talked not necessarily early but often. This foreign little manbeast in our midst has thrown us for a loop. And, by the way, all those liberal, “gender identification is implanted by behaviors” are full of too much free trade mocha soy blends. This kid is boy. 100% not-learning-it-from-Mommy boy. Crawl on anything, bounce on the landing, grass stained boy.

In college, in kiddie psych classes and childrens development lectures I loved the term “language explosion.” Now we’re bracing for one under our roof. Just this calendar month it’s been a word-a-day around here. We think he actually said “please” tonight. We’re so shocked by the little parrot’s perfect annunciation that we sit agape asking each other, “Did he just–?” “I think he did!” while the little monkey himself laughs at the both of us with sparkling eyes and clapping hands.

All these months all our words have been baking in his head and they’re popping out like cookies.

And we’re eating our fill.