James's new hat

Hat on.

Hat off.

Anatomically incorrect

A friend of Henry's came over the other day along with her ma. As is liable to happen when preschoolers congregate, his friend ended up without the leggings and underpants she'd worn under her dress.

After they left, Henry was quick to confide what he'd noticed: "Mommy, I saw that Magda* has a Volvo under her dress. And a butt."

*Not her actual name, naturally.

Jupiter

I love the New Year holiday; it leaves Christmas in the dust, as far as I am concerned. I love the clean, clear, fresh idea of it, the monastic optimism of resolutions, the fact that its twin motifs are pleasure and reflectiveness. I have spent New Year's Eves in my life lots of different ways: eating snails & dipping my tongue into a glass of champagne at Dad's house as a child, attending very chaste co-ed sleepovers at Fiona Stoner's house in high school, dressing to the nines for a quiet night at home, howling at the moon in Bryan Park, burning the bad out of the old year with a muneca, and, most often, sleeping.

Yesterday morning I was, unexpectedly, sick with grief. I remembered that last New Year's Day was the last time I spoke to Dad when he was cogent, when I called to wish him a happy new year. What happened was so horrible, but I don't feel like stomping on the ashes of 2011. It was good to spend the evening quietly with friends: first with new friends--friends I made in 2011--and their families, surrounded by children, and then later with old friends, and Mom and Virginia. I had planned to take Henry and James home to bed before going on to Carol and Ron's house, but at the last moment decided to bring them along, and I am so glad I did.

James was awake long enough to smile & show off his brand-new knitted balaclava, then spent the next two hours sleeping with the focus of a yogi in my lap and in Mom's. Henry spent most of the time mute and hiding under a table, eating chocolate half-dollars, but just before we were ready to leave, he grew bold and went to make friends with Ron, stargazing on the back deck.

As we started driving home, Henry said to me from the back seat, "That's a good man."
"Yes," I agreed. "You mean Ron?"
"Yes," Henry said. "He just picked me right up to look." The he offered the highest praise he could come up with. "Daddy loooves Ron."
"Well," I said, "Daddy only met Ron one time. He doesn't know him very well."
"Then who lifted Daddy up to look at planets when he was a kid?"

It was good to be lifted up last night.

(This morning I encouraged Henry to tell Peter which planet Ron had held him up to see. He hesitated, then remembered: "Judith.")

A little late

Henry & James shared a 3-year/1-year appointment at the pediatrician's a couple of weeks ago.

In fact, we've had a lot of doctor, for us, this month. A week or two before his scheduled visit, Henry was struck with a mystery wintertime virus that sent his temperature spiking up to nearly 105, causing a febrile seizure that we were told was in fact quite mild. I believe it now, but at 11:30 at night, when your kid's eyes that he has barely opened all day are wide with terror because his body is jerking uncontrollably, the word mild does. not. register.It's just not in the lexicon at all. We called 911.

In spite of his obvious misery, Henry was excited by the ambulance pulling up in front of the house--a reassuring sign. On the ambulance driver's advice, we drove him ourselves to the ER--after first waking James from an unusually sound sleep, naturally--where we watched the nurse give him liquid tylenol, he got tested for flu, strep, and pneumonia, and we then waited an hour or two for the doctor to tell us he had a mystery wintertime virus that would probably run its course by the end of the weekend (i.e., by the time the pediatrician's office was open again), as indeed it did.

And then, at the regular checkup, James's lead levels were found to be high, so we had to go back again for another blood draw. We're still waiting for the results of that.

In the meantime, sufficient unto the day is the evil thereof. Here's the good stuff:

JAMES at 1 year
Weight: 20 lbs. (10th percentile)
Height: 29 inches (25th percentile)
Head: 46.5 cm. (50th percentile)

HENRY at 3 years
Weight:: 31.5 lbs (50th percentile)
Height: 36.75 inches (25th percentile)
BMI: 16.4 (50th percentile)

You talking to me?

It's a delight to see Henry developing new linguistic & cognitive tricks: Just lately, we are awash in metaphors. The snow was a blanket on a heap of dried grass this morning (a tired cliche from me, but from Henry, fresh and apt); when it fell yesterday afternoon, it looked like spider webs. With each bite of a corn chip today, he held it up afresh to decide what it looked like: a moon! a shoe! an angel! a ghost! a boat!

I particularly enjoyed his employment this morning of a different poetic device: personification.

He rushed into the bathroom, proclaiming he needed help unzipping his pajamas so he could poop. He then asked me to leave him alone, as he usually does. But just a minute or two later, he popped back into the kitchen.

"Are you done?" I asked, surprised.

"I thought I needed to poop," he said, "But my butt said, 'no thank you.'"

Economics 101

Monday mornings are hard for Henry. After two whole days of Daddy, he hates waking up to realize that Peter has gone to work. Almost every week we have some version of this conversation:

HENRY: I want Daddy to BE here!
ME: Daddy is at work.
HENRY: I don't WANT Daddy to go to work.
ME: I know. But Daddy has to go to work.
HENRY: Whyyyy?
ME: To get money. Daddy makes money for us to buy our food and pay for our house and heat our house and drive our car.
HENRY (happy now): And for me to throw in fountains! (Thinks for a bit.) And for James when he gets bigger to throw in fountains!

Better keep your nose to the grindstone, Peter.

That was the month that was

October, obviously, was a lost month as far as the blog is concerned. In brief, I turned 40, the Law School held its memorial for Dad, and our next-door neighbor got shot. In an ordinary year, I love October, and even this rather rotten iteration of it had its charms. But even those are mostly undocumented, because also this October, our computer was infected on two separate occasions with a virus that is even now keeping me from getting to the photos I'd like to post.
That being so, I will, for now, simply report that the month got off to a grand start when Henry received two pieces of personal mail--his first-ever letters--on the same day. Complete text follows.

From Henry & James's dog-cousin in San Diego, in reply to a letter Henry sent:
Henry!
I am under the table, waiting for dinner. What do you eat for dinner? I eat hard pellets. They taste like fish.
I went to the beach today. I ran and ran and barked and ran and ran and jumped and ran and ran and swam! Then I had a bath.
I hate baths! Do you like baths?
Love, Abby (the dog)
P.S. I know you can't read, so here's a picture: [you'll just have to use your imaginations here] <--- I rescued the ball from a giant wave! There were also birds.

From Ballantine Road, in response to momentous events:
Darling Henry,
Hello Sweetie. Congratulations on going poopoo in the potty. Wonderful and great job. We all love you. Love Auntie Virginia
Congratulations! Love, Eleanor
Will
Grandmama