Growing Up--Marcia

I walk the mile or so to school this morning. The trees are grey and silver. Every breath becomes a cloud. It is so bitterly cold my nostrils ache. But it feels good to feel my feet move over the ground. I love the grey, pink, bruised blue colors of a sky aching for snow.

I remember walking through deep snow to get to the art studios at my college. I'd trudge out in a wool skirt, vintage petticoat, long undies, heavy boots, down coat, and hat. We had no choice but to walk. It is my oldest child's eleventh birthday. I want to find a way to mark it. I can walk and remember.

It snowed the night before he was born. My sister and brother-in-law were catering a Christmas party about 40 minutes north in the country. Some rich guy with a 70 stall garage. He wanted a luau and roast pig. The boys had never done a roast pig before. Betsy and Andy made it there and back over the snow-thick roads, but not without Andy winding up covered in pig fat from trying to carve that buried pig.

I filmed that day, not the pig fest, but the snow storm. The deep quiet everywhere. The branches laden with their fingers of snow. Funny, I gave birth to the loudest baby ever born in the Rogue Valley Medical Center--Daniel-The Fire-Breathing-Baby from Hell.

He yelled and he nursed. The only place he would sleep was on my chest, head tucked under my chin. That held true, minus the nursing part, until he was about six years old.

Daniel is 5 ft. tall now. He looks good in his jeans. He loves basketball shoes and knows how to move in them. He scored 18 points out of 22 at his last basketball game, and yet if you ask him how many baskets he made, he doesn't know the answer. He still loves to be read to, wants to snuggle when we watch movies, will play "guys" with his little brother, and run around in a dinosaur costume that is way too small. He will try to make friends with anyone and is sad if it doesn't work out. He still misses his best friend from Kindergarten, but still has his best friend from first grade.

He just asked for Axe deodorant--I also got him the shower gel. It promises to make "Dirty Boys Clean." Oh boy. Can't wait.

Eleven.

He is no longer "10 and under . . ." The expectations are greater. The pressure increases. I feel it within myself. Then I have to remember he is interested in the world, loves people, is fun-loving, kind to others, and still has a sense of wonder.

Happy birthday my beautiful, beautiful child.