Nine

I took these photos of my boy over the week-end and they make me smile each time I look at them. He is my heart, all angst and mood swings and adorably long bambi legs. I'm sure there will come a time soon when I will no longer receive permission to write about him here, for now he's fine with it and so I can indulge myself. I write about it simply because I know how easy it is to forget. This boy of mine is almost the same age I was when I lost my father, somehow just carrying that information propels me to collect and store as much as I can about this time and all of the times to come, for fear of it being forgotten or lost, for his sake and mine and all the future offspring that are to come to this clan of ours.

The first picture reminds me so so much of myself, it is alarmingly familiar. I looked this way for a long time I think. I certainly still feel that way often, even now as I quickly approach my fortieth year. Like I say to this boy of mine, some of us are born 'to feel ways about stuff' very strongly and all of the time, our emotions are a set to 'roller coaster' as I like to think of it. Ever-changing. 

This boy of mine like me and like my father, can talk and talk and talk and talk some more and once he's set on talking, there ain't nothing that's gonna stop him. Not even one of my 'Just stop talking, I can't think because I'm doing three things at once' kind of looks. This boy knows just which button to press to make me a crazy, lid off the blender maniac! And I love him even more for that! He also knows how to make the best pouting bottom lip apologies with still a little hint of 'I don't think I'm actually wrong' which I think is inspired by me. He's  much more of a fixer than a sulker and for that I am so grateful since I feel I have spent far too much of my own time over the years sulking, even if I disguised it well. He is a helper and a great reminder, 'remember that shirt dad said he liked', 'remember it's grandma's birthday on the 21st', 'remember you said we could go to the park on our bikes'! He is great company and I love the time that his dad and I get to spend with him alone in the evenings after his younger brother is in bed. 

I love the endless facts that he tells me from his nature books, his science books, the hobbit, lord of the rings. I love the memorised dialogue he recalls from his favourite films and the observations he makes about continuity errors or additional facts that he has from watching the directors talk in the extras, just like his father likes to do. I love to hear him talk animatedly with his dad about stuff that they mutually like that I have absolutely no interest in. Sometimes I'm mean and way too quick to want him to stop talking about said stuff that I have no interest in but I get swept away with guilt because he is so enthusiastic, if feels utterly wrong not to get caught up in it too! I love the tender way he connects to friends and loved ones and the associations he makes with them, like enjoying watching birds in the garden through our glass doors which makes him think of his Laolao or studying facts about trees and plants and animals in Madagascar to remind him of his cousins and aunt and uncle living out there. I love the national geographic magazines left open at the pages of interest on the bathroom floor, the programming text book at his bedside, the bookshelves in our sitting room that are lined with his things - binoculars and coins and homemade traps for bugs and drawings with ideas for 'big projects' that are still in planning stages. All of it. Even the persistent humming. Even the clapping and the cup song and the clicking of fingers and the air guitar accompanied by his reciting of the musical notes he's memorised set to the tune of the latest guitar song he's learning. Imagine E C G D A E B to the tune of Drunken Sailor for example, oh and if he were here he'd correct the letters I've selected and tell me the correct order whilst saying something like: 'I don't mean to be rude but the notes you've written aren't correct.'

I like him. I like him a lot. He is funny, very very funny and dry and witty! He sings in perfect pitch and when you happen upon him singing The Misty Mountains Cold it reduces you to tears. I can't help but think of all that is to come of him and from him. I tell him often that I look forward to spending time with him in all the years to come, I tell him that I'll always look forward to his visits and to hearing about all the things he's into and up to. I hope he remembers this and stops by often.