Achoooo

Even though it is late and I really should be getting to bed, I wanted to write to you. I’ve been meaning to write, honestly, it’s just that it is finally nice outside and I finally have some time off to spend with my boys and I have rediscovered hobbies and physical activity and my neighbors and, well, there just hasn’t been time.

In short, I’ve been out living a life I love.

There are so many stories to share with you, so much to tell you, but it’s hard to sum it up. Life seems so full , too robust to put into bullet points. Each story deserves its own well crafted paragraph. But that would keep me from creating a new story out in the world. And so these stories sit in my head and wait for a rainy day.

As a sample…

We’ve been biking a lot lately. The other day, we took a trip to the park and had a picnic dinner among the flowers and grass while we listened to the river a short walk away. Colin rides in a trailer behind Patrick and prefers the route along the water as he has become very fond of the ducks and geese and fish that live there. He tries to greet each one, waving and calling “hiiiii” in a high, clear voice as we pedal along in the twilight. When we stopped to eat, Patrick and I stretched out in the grass, resting our legs and cooling down in the grass. Colin elected to climb up (“UUUP! Upupupupupup…”) onto a nearby park bench and eat his sandwich there. He is so big, so grown up, so independent.

Last week, I performed in a production of The Vagina Monologues, a show that was profoundly moving to me when I saw it in college. It was much different that I remembered and I was reminded how much I have changed since I was 18 years old, but it was a fantastic experience and I am glad to have had the opportunity. Then, I was young and relatively stupid. I saw the world as a place of infinite opportunity and saw this play as a means to reaching a goal. I still see that now, but my perspective is colored by my life, my loves, my choices, my training. So much of the premise of the play is based on the mystery of the vagina, both as a sexual organ and as a part of a woman’s identity. While I identified with this in college, I have, shall we say, studied since then. It is no longer a mystery to me, to be honest. It is no less wonderful or lovely or worth celebrating, but it is not something that I need to ponder.

More importantly, when I was young and stupid I could turn a blind, innocent eye to the just beneath the surface anti-man sentiment that runs throughout the script, but I am a different person now. I am the wife of a good man and I am the mother of a sweet and perfect little boy and if anyone dares to tell me that men are not worth their weight in the world and in the fight against violence against women, I will personally take them out back and show them what these two boys have inspired in me.

Colin had his first trip to the zoo today. He didn’t have much patience for some reason, but his favorite animal was… wait for it… the barnyard chicken. To each his own.

Every minute of every day we tell Colin that we love him. I sing him terrible songs that I make up on the spot with lyrics like “I love Colin, yes, I love my Colin” and the like. We call it out throughout the house when he escapes to other rooms. We tell him when he wakes up in the morning and when we drop him at school. And we remind him many times at night, just before bed. Patrick and I stand in his room and pass him back and forth, snuggling and kissing and loving him to sleep. We say goodnight to the pictures of his family, our family, on the wall and tell him that they all love him and will watch over him while he sleeps. We pet the dogs on the head - gently! -and accept warm kisses from them. We linger over the edge of his crib, stealing last snuggles until he finally leans to his bed, begging for sleep, and we oblige, reminding him all the time of how much we love him.

“Good night,” we coo as we tiptoe out. “We love you. So much.”

And tonight, softly: “Achoooo,” said in the same tone we use to tell him we love him.

It’s as if my whole life was leading up to that moment when my little Colin could acknowledge that he knows, he hears me, he understands that I love him. And repeats it back.