Happy Birthday to my writer

11 years ago tonight I was in the hospital, waiting for George to be born...

I'm going to write my annual list of "Things I love about George right now," but first a word about his latest writing project, which was just published online here. It's called "Commander Cat" and it's about a kid who finds a secret portal to an online gaming world, enters it, and ends up becoming their hero. He actually came up with the story when he was in kindergarten, on the playground--at recess he used to assign roles to a bunch of other kids and they would act out various parts of the story. He finally wrote it all out (changing it a fair amount in the process) for an online creative writing workshop he just finished through Northwestern's CTD.

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Well, the way life goes these days, I started this post, and now a few weeks have gone by and I haven't finished it. So now it's after George's birthday, but I'm still going to write my list/letter.

Dear George,

You are now eleven and are quite the young man. You have always been wise beyond your years, but you have really matured by leaps and bounds since becoming a big brother. I catch myself even more often than I used to forgetting that you're a kid! Which in some ways you don't mind, because you hate it when adults patronize kids by having reduced expectations of them.

Despite all the maturing, of course, you're still the same wonderful George you've always been.... I continue to be very much in awe of your creativity! It flows through you. I love acting as your scribe when it's flowing too fast for you to keep up with yourself. I sit with my laptop on the leather couch up in the man cave while you pace back and forth, and around the pool table, dictating to me. When you pause, I used to think something like "Oh no, he's out of ideas for what's going to happen next," but it makes me laugh to remember that now because you are *never* out of ideas. It is great fun, and it feels like a great privilege, to witness your creative process in action.

But it's not just all of your amazing ideas that have me in awe. It's your tremendous facility, ability, in expressing them. You have such flair. You can turn a phrase like nobody's business. You are very aware of the conventions and devices of the various genres that you write in, and employ them with ease--and talk about them critically when questioned about them. At 10 (now 11), you are one of the best writers I know. (I mean one of the best writers I know personally :-)

I love that I can talk to you about just about anything.

I love that you took a CTD course called "Computer Gaming Academy," where you learned how to design computer games using a certain program, and you haven't stopped designing games ever since, and have even helped several of your friends (and your cousin, I think) design some games.

I love being able to homeschool you, and I love exploring different models of learning/schooling with you. I love that I can discuss those models with you as we explore them! That you're interested in that sort of thing. And I love that because you are homeschooled (increasingly unschooled), you have plenty of time for all of your creative endeavors. I hope I'm doing right by you. Sometimes homeschooling feels like a huge responsibility. I rarely wonder if public school would be a better option for you, but I do sometimes wonder if I'm approaching homeschooling in the best way possible for you. I'm definitely making it up as I go along! In any case, I do love being on that journey with you.

I love watching "Good Luck, Charlie" with you, and laughing and laughing.

I love what a sophisticated consumer of popular culture you are. You said to me one morning recently, "Have you ever noticed how kids' cereal commercials are all the same?" and then you proceeded to give me a critique/analysis of the common elements of about 5 different cereal commercials. You did the same about family sitcoms, pointing out various stock characters that always seem to be in play. It's funny because this kind of literary/cultural analysis is in some sense what I do for a living, but I think it comes easier to you than it does to me!

You know that most of all I love your kindness. And your incredible consideration for other people's feelings in all kinds of circumstances.

I love how sweet you are with your baby brother. Like how when Bob and I are playing tennis, you'll talk to Ben and play with him in the car until he's bored and then you'll put him in his stroller and walk him around the park. I love how you make him laugh.

I love your exuberance toward the band, and my songs, and my singing. (You are really great for my self-confidence!) I love it when you walk around the house singing--one minute it will be a song Bob and I have written, and the next it will be something from your choir, and the next it might be a song you're currently learning on recorder. So it's not just that I love how supportive you are of my music, I also love your involvement with and appreciation of all kinds of music.

I love how unflinching you are in the face of peer pressure. You are your own person. You do not live your life wondering, worrying, what other people think. It's not that you don't care what others think. But you're not going to let that stop you from doing or liking something. And it's another reason why I'm glad I'm able to homeschool you--that you don't have to deal with all of that pressure to conform all day long. I know from when you were in public school that the pressure to conform (much of which came from your teacher!) didn't ever really make you conform, but it did cause a lot of friction and unpleasantness in your day. And I love how you are almost sort of baffled when people you know are affected by peer pressure.

I just took another break in writing this post because you came up to the man cave, where I've been, and we talked and talked for like an hour... about church(es), about peer pressure, about school, homeschooling, and unschooling, about what we're going to do this afternoon to get out of the house, besides chess club (I'm off from teaching this week, and Bob's going to be cleaning the house so we want to get out of his way!).... I love our conversations, and I know you do, too (I know 'cuz you just told me). And I love that you love the man cave. That might sound silly or weird but I do. You have a sort of relationship to this space and I think it's really cool. You love to come up here in the morning before anyone else is up, especially if it's raining--sometimes you'll bring your pillow and blanket and a book (ok, it's never just one book--it's always a whole stack), and you'll snuggle up under your blanket on the couch and listen to the rain on the roof while you read.... I love it.

I guess it's time to get on with my/our day, so I'll wrap this up. But happy birthday, George. It's a privilege and a pleasure being your mom. I can't wait to see what fun things this next year will bring, what great stories you'll write, what new passions will develop (speaking of which, I feel this letter would be incomplete without a mention of Pokemon and Lego Ninjago, two of your current passions!).... Thanks for being you. I love you.

Love,
Mom

Baby Ben Update

Life has been way too crazy to find time for blogging... and also too crazy to keep up with the baby book I had so diligently been filling out every month for Ben. But I have a few spare minutes (not really, but...), so I thought I'd jot down what Baby Ben has been up to the last few days.

He continues, of course, to be a total joy! Pretty much the happiest, smiley-est little guy you ever did see.

He had been working so much on various physical developments (crawling, standing, cruising...) that he hadn't said any new words in quite a while. But now he's on a verbal learning streak again. New additions to his vocabulary include uh-oh, which sounds more like "uh-uh", uttered whenever something falls or gets knocked over (usually by him, and usually on purpose); all gone, which sounds more like "ah-guh!"; all done, which, you guessed it, sounds like "ah-duh"; up, pronounced very clearly and decipherably; and arms up, which sounds like "ah-up" or "ah-uh", and is always accompanied by his putting his arms up in the air. While all of these utterances are completely adorable and sweet, "up" has to be my favorite. He finds occasion to say it all the time. For example, he'll sit up in bed right when he first wakes up, with his eyes still half-closed, he'll bust out a definitive, authoritative "up!" Or if we're up in the man cave, he'll proudly proclaim "up" when he sees Bob coming up the stairs. Or when he's in one of his exersaucers or a high chair and wants to get out. Or when he sees someone stand up. Or when he pulls himself up. What a great early word! So multi-purpose, and so positive....

On the flip side, he has figured out what "no" is and when you say it to him he'll give you the most serious little look, almost a stern look, and start shaking his head. This is when he's doing something he really wants to keep doing and you're telling him not to. If he doesn't mind being told no or if he hears us saying no to each other or if we read it in a book, he gets the most adorable little smile on his face and then shakes his head. If you ask him a question, any question, he'll usually smile and shake his head.

Actually, that's not quite true. If you ask him, when he's on the bed, if he wants to go up to the man cave, he'll smile and clap. If you ask him if he wants some num-nums he'll perk right up and start looking around for where you're hiding the goods. And if you ask him if he wants to go somewhere with you and he does, he'll book right on over to you as fast as he can and put his arms up, waiting for you to pick him up. He's definitely a baby on the go, and would rather not be left behind!

More physical feats of late... in addition to the head-shaking and the clapping, and the crawling, standing, and cruising, he's become quite the acrobat. The other day he did a full flip off the side of the bed, fortunately landing in the laundry basket. With a pillow on top of himself (he was trying to climb over the pillow, which was on the side of the bed, and which flipped right along with him). He has also figured out the best way to get down off of something (couch, chair, bed) is to dive, head first. He does it slowly, and puts his arms out, but he does often land on his head. He's such a tough little guy, though. He very rarely cries.

Laurie, one of his godmothers, noticed what a little tough guy he is the other day when he closed his baby laptop right on his thumb. She said he pulled the thumb out, looked at it for a second, then sort of brushed it off on his leg and continued playing.

I was similarly impressed when he fell off the bed the other day (not his careful sliding that he does on purpose) and landed on his head, with a thud, on the wood floor. (Where was his mother?! I was sitting right next to him but had taken my eye off of him for a second. It does not take long for a baby to fall off the side of a bed!). Anyway, he didn't so much as whimper. He said something sort of like "eh!" and then got up into a crawling position, and crawled right out the bedroom door, obviously quite pleased with himself for breaking out of the prison of the bed, and eager to explore. He headed out into the hallway (with mom tailing him very, very closely) and paused as if trying to decide which way to go. He opted for the route up to the man cave, crawling quite quickly across the floor and over to the stairs. Previously, he had only ever mounted one or two of them, but I guess he was feeling emboldened by his new-found freedom, and he climbed up every last stair until he got up to Dada at the top.

Speaking of Dada, though he remains utterly attached to Bob, he still doesn't really say Dada so much! It's gotten to be almost a running joke now and in fact we sometimes wonder if Ben is holding out on purpose because he thinks it's funny or something. Until recently, if you'd say "Dada" to Ben, he'd look at you like he was thinking about it and then he'd reply "MA-MA". But now he has a new response: "Bah-Bob!" It sort of sounds like a cross between "Bob" and the word for daddy in Italian ("Babbo"), both of which he's heard Bob called, but honestly, we all call Bob "Dada" wayyyy more than we call him anything else, so it's kind of funny that for whatever reason Ben's just not saying it. The funny thing about it is both how dada is supposed to be one of the easiest words to say, and also how attached he is to his dada. I mean, he was saying mama by about 3 months, and Lindsey and George soon thereafter, and he even said Linda (quite discernibly) when we went to visit my family in CA and he took a strong, instant liking to his Aunt Linda.

He also remains very attached to his big sissy. The other night when it was time for Lindsey to go to bed, and Ben saw that she was leaving the room, he protested so insistently and loudly that we just had to let her stay up an extra hour to hang out with him! He'll be very happy this summer when she's back with us every day.

He continues to love music, and fortunately he has expanded his tastes from $&!#-kickin' country to various other genres. The other day I had Mardi Gras music on Music Choice on the TV. He cruised across the front of the TV stand until he got to the volume button on the sound system. He cranked it all the way to "max volume" (which really is quite loud!), looked back at me, and then proceeded to start dancing!

I have so much more to say, but I'll wrap this up with one of the sweetest things he does, and that is giving out kisses. He doesn't really do the kissing motion with his lips--he just sort of opens his mouth and puts it on your cheek, and then pulls his face back a little and gives you the most adorable little smile, like he knows he's done something sweet. He's done this on occasion for quite some time (mostly to Bob at first), but now he's really doing it often. And he's started dispensing these to the cats, when he can catch them--somewhat to their dismay!

Somehow I'm managing to enjoy all of this quite fully, despite being stressed out/overwhelmed by work much of the time. I'm definitely counting the weeks to the end of the semester....