Musings

Sometimes the changes in my baby are so subtle that nobody but me would notice them. Nothing but tiny details that flicker past me during the day...the way he looks at someone or the way he notices what I point out to him. He is growing into a child and I am so happy and so scared and so excited all at the same time. I don't have a newborn baby anymore and that fact is hitting me suddenly, like a giant light bulb slowly coming to life over my head...making that crackling noise that a classroom fluorescent makes when you first turn it on. Colin watched a little boy at the pool today so intently, his eyes darting with every splash and jump, his body tense with the need to jump with him. I could see it in his face and feel it in his muscles...this desire to be bigger, stronger, more independent from me. I watch all the children at the pool and in my head I am putting them all into categories in perspective to my son. It is like a running ticker sliding constantly across my mind:

That boy is Colin next summer...that one is the summer after next...that baby is
Colin last winter...that one is Colin in 5 years...10 years...how old are the
ones on the slide...will Colin be that rough, probably not, I was a sensitive
child...then again, maybe...is he 16....he seems so old...are those girls old
enough to have so little on...God, did I just think that??

While this little thought parade marches through my head, sweet Colin stands on the side of the beach area where he can pound his little palms on the "Do Not Dive" sign. The simple act of watching the water splash over the words makes him so happy. He looks back at me every now and then and laughs and I laugh with him. I hover beside him and he turns around and takes drunken baby steps into my arms and then pushes away again, back to inspecting the tiny bits of gravel around the diving sign. We sit like this for what seems like a long time, just me and my baby boy. I have another month to call him my newborn. I am certain that he will forever be my baby boy.

(just as a heads up...as Colin's birthday approaches, I will get even more mushy :-)