Already experiencing empty nest

Noah has been doing a little less groaning and a lot more chattering in the last couple of days. He puffs out his cheeks, puckers his lips and goes “ba da da da ba ba maaa.” I can’t even express how adorable it is. And he looks as though he is speaking with such purpose, and maybe he is but he can’t seem to make himself understood.

It will be a long time before first words and though I don’t want to rush one moment of his childhood I’m excited for him to learn to communicate. Not to mention have some of those “Kids say the darndest things” moments. At four years old my nephews James and Julius were all sorts of precocious and funny on Sunday. When James told me Noah had a “tornado head” it took me a moment to realize that he was referring to the way Noah’s hair emanates from an eye of the storm circle on the back of his head. When Julius got a Darth Vader popsicle he told Mark that Darth Vader was on “the dark side of the flowers.” I so look forward to the funny little comments Noah will some day make.

Ofelia’s boys at 4, 14 and 20 got me thinking about all the stages Noah will go through. The 14 year old twins were completely in their own world. They preferred being off on their own skateboarding in the development to hanging out with the family. And they are already in that teen eye-rolling phase where you can tell that anyone older than them is SO uncool. Fourteen seems like a tough age. But to me the scariest stage is the one that 20 year old Joe is in. He’s in the Marines and Ofelia says almost every time she gets to talk to him on the phone that she cries afterwards. She said it’s hard to remember that he’s a grown man now, that he’s less communicative, less sensitive and has his own thing going on. She said she wants to tell him she is worried about him and that he should be careful, but she has to tone it down because is he sees how much she worries about him and wants to protect him that he’ll pull away.

One of the things that concerns me about raising a boy is what our relationship will be like when he’s grown. I don’t think boys are as good about calling their moms, about talking with their moms about their lives. Of course I’m just generalizing and I don’t have much real evidence to make those assumptions on. It’s just another thing to worry about because I never have enough. Not even with Mark suggesting this weekend that when Noah stiffens up sometimes that it might not be gas or his temper as I had supposed but could be some kind of muscle spasm or seizure. We both realize this is absolutely preposterous and have dismissed it, but it doesn’t stop me from getting worried again every time he does it.

On the invitations to my baby shower Patrice included a quote about how hard it is to have your child/your heart out their walking around in the world without you always there protect it. And GOD is that true. Hell – even when I’m here to protect Noah I’m worrying about what might go wrong in 20 years time.

Anywho – Noah and I have a lunch date with my mom today so we better get a move on.