One of the advantages of PZH getting older is that he has more energy and is able to stay up longer than he did four months ago. Despite his best efforts though, he still has a "firm"night-night time frame. Those moments that adults get to themselves are fewer and further between. That is not to come across as a complaint, fact is there isn't anything else that I would rather do.
Pierce's fascination with most anything has sky rocketed in to a stratosphere that only children can enter and only parents of children have a chance of interpreting. Do you remember how interesting leaves are? Do you remember how fun mulch could be? Do you remember when playing in the dirt was the best and getting dirty was a necessary part of a fun day? Do you remember how fun pulling a door stop 90 degrees and letting go was? Hearing the door stop boing back and forth tickles the core of a child's' innocence.
What about, the geniusness of a tissue box? Did you know if you pull one tissue out, another identical tissue replaces it? TRY IT, Pierce would say. He has, to the tune of about 27 Kleenex boxes. He gets the biggest tickle out of pulling them out, one after the other until there are no more. When he discovers a new Kleenex box, his eyes sparkle and I can see him open the cockpit of his rocket ship before he blasts off into that stratosphere. He looks at it and thinks to himself, "dang it, who put all those tissues back in the box?" I think he feels like it's his responsibility, neigh, his mission to extract every last one, when he's done, he looks at us with an expression that suggests he's accomplished one of his chores, hopefully he's as dedicated to taking out the trash?
We love exploring wherever we're at but the front yard affords a convenient opportunity. We rip up big leaves like we rip up TP. We judiciously sift through the bark and to find and separate the best pieces. We especially like to twist and pull the pretty white perennials.
Re-experiencing life's inaugurals is an unanticipated residual blessing of parenthood. I would never have guessed how amusing it would be to watch my son: open and shut a door, close a drawer or deliberately move his Dada's socks from one drawer to another with specific intent.
My parents talk about the day I left for college being a tough day, it was for me too. I am not thinking about crossing that bridge yet but I do draw comparisons when I watch Pierce explore never before seen objects. Just like my parents watched the red tail lights of my 1998 Ford Taurus take me to an unfamiliar world, I watch Pierce's red low tops and his unique combination of crawling and walking help him venture out in to his own unknown. It'll be a while before I see his Camry's tail lights, I'm sure we'll need those 27 Kleenex boxes then but for now we'll enjoy these precious moments.
My experiences are new to me, the lessons learned are probably not new to you. Most of the time, I'm just working out in my head what the "Silver and Black Lining" is?
