Linus (11 memories on a Thursday).

Awaken.

His long blond hair tickled my face as he rolled over next to me, his five-year old breath smelling like a five-year old’s in the early morning. I was not ready to awaken, but I needed to, and I took an extra minute to lie there in the early morning soaking in his mass of hair and breath and warm body snuggled up, and I decided I could afford to invest another minute or two soaking the experience in and trying to make sure it transitions to the long-term memory archives.

Awaken!

I left the five-year old in our bed and greeted the two-year old, awake for some time, and impatient for his playmate to rise as well. We read, wrestled, we discussed Balkan geopolitics with intense interest on my part, but he would not be dissuaded, so he headed to forcibly awaken his elder brother.

When I say ‘forcibly,’ I mean that he picked up a TOY rifle. A toy rifle that was a childhood toy of mine going back many decades, and survived multiple moves and temporary burials in different boxes, bins, tubs, attics, and garages, and eventually resurfaced in time for a 2-year old to find it.

This is a metal rifle. It does not shoot anything and has no capability of doing so. When you cock it, it emits a harrumph air-powered non-electronic sound that is strangely satisfying. This is the rifle that he picked up and suggested casually that he’d take it down to help wake his brother up.

There is another conversation to be had about guns and toy guns and imagination and play and…a lot of swirling, important conversations to be had. I don’t know what to say exactly. Except that I have kept it, and…we have it it, and…there is, I hope, some good play and some good conversations to come out of its continued existence.

It also provided me the opportunity to teach (or rather, remind) a two-year old that we don’t wake people up by shooting them.

Even when we’re desperate to play with them.

Directives of and to a 2-year old leader

Let’s go play outside,
I said, a question or statement that generally elicits little controversy.

I can’t go outside!
he said.

Huh?
I looked at his blond-hair swiped over his two-year old eyes.
Why not?

He brushed his hair back.
Because he said,
unsuccessfully trying to keep it from drooping over his nose, and stating a fact that runs antithetical to historic reality,
because I don’t want to get dirty.

You don’t want to get dirty? I asked suspiciously.

Yeah,
he said with a giant grin.
I don’t like getting dirty.

I don’t believe you.
I said.

And history backs me up.

Breakfast

I believe some individuals ate a mix of cold cereal and old popcorn. I don’t know what else to say. There was a lot of laughing.

Tom Sawyer (a 12-year old)

He powerwashed a portion of our driveway with his freshly-12-year old arms holding the wand securely. I watched and marveled at what a short time ago it was where he toddled around, barely able to hold up a garden hose. And now…those burly, Adonis-sleek arms wield a jet stream of high-powered water at the collected detritus of our driveway. His cheeky grin remains; I love the mix of boy and man that inhabits this fellow at this stage.

It’s wonderful to be able to hand off - or at least get help with - certain tasks now.

Tom’s friends (a 5-year old)

When you make work look fun, onlookers are bound to jump in.

That is what happened.

Water balloons

One of the joys of summer childhood is being able to swing between things like playing outside and watching a good film inside.

They finished up The Incredibles, one of my favorite Pixar films still, and he announced:

‘Okay, we’re done, let’s go back outside now.’

So that is what they did, and three boys stumbled upon water balloons, and they were used with great fury coupled with raucous laughter.

Some time later…

The girls had a previous engagement which took them off the mountain, and our oldest son had an evening to hang out with his cool dude of Adonis uncle, so I stayed in with my two youngest stalwarts, started Incredibles 2 while eating cold cereal that was well prayed for, and FaceTimed with Jonny and my eldest son.

An aside that is everything

It is a wonderful thing to experience the bulk of life together with the full force of our full family. It is also a wonderful thing to see different combinations of people making memories and building strong relationships together.

My oldest son and my brother.
My oldest daughter and my wife.
My two youngest boys with each other.

Sometimes you step forward and create strong bonds.
Sometimes you step backward, or aside, and let other strong bonds be created.

This might be a Top Ten all time lesson

If you want to have the strongest and healthiest bonds with those you care about the most…

…you have to encourage, support, and cheer on the opportunities those you care about most have to create strong, healthy bonds with others.

Summary

I reflected a bit on this day; a day that was so normal and so singular.

(‘singular’ is one of my words to overuse this year. I’ll take a sabbatical from it next year, but this year? I’m running it into the ground)

Every day, when you look at it either in advance or in retrospect, has the potential to be a) experienced as singular, and/or b) remembered as singular.

I don’t always do the greatest job of experiencing a (normal) day as otherwise singular and unique, but I try…and beyond that, I try hard to remember and place in my longtime memory the things that made it special.