I crawl  into the last month of 2011. My back’s out. I’m all tweaked. Many things are going beautifully and just as they should. But I’m uneasy. Perhaps it’s the month that’s dragging me down. F’ing December. Always a time for introspection. And holiday madness. But it’s not just that.  It’s trying to understand and support the small people living in our house. And I try too hard.

FOUR

Alejandro Marcellus is four going on fourteen. He’s kind. Articulate. Extremely logical. Persuasive. His interests include: Fighting. Star Wars. Things that get blown up. “Walking skeletons.” Lego video games on the Playstation. His scooter and new bike. Playing with action figures, particularly those with guns, light sabers, knives, swords, scythes, axes, cannons, or other weapons. (You know. Right? Ahem.) He gets shy when he walks into a room full of people. Alejandro’s also very into us, his family. He gives great hugs and kisses to mommy and daddy. He high-fives most everyone else.

But I worry that I don’t understand him enough. Because, seriously, I’ve never been into pretending to shoot people. I remember a lot of talking stuffed animals in my childhood games.

And our wills can collide. Alejandro doesn’t give up. He will ask and ask and ask and reposition his request and ask again. It drives me crazy. I don’t know where he gets it.

All of this adds up to the fact that I’m in awe of the boy. I try to keep calm, and yes I’m in therapy, but he just seems so shockingly bright I’m confounded. I just love him so much, I hope I can give him what he needs.

ONE

Story Jane Fernandez. A girl named Story. Oh yes we did. She’s now a year old. A beautiful girl–the name fits her perfectly. She’s rather magical. Good natured and outgoing. Her first “sign” was dog (panting) and her first word was “hi.” “Hi” is a constant. She says it waving to strangers: “Hiiiii!” It’s delightful.

She started walking at 11 months, and since then she is EVERYWHERE. Holy heck! She’s bashing into everything. Falling down. Into everything.  It’s like scattergories in our house and in my brain. Hard to keep up. And of course she doesn’t sleep through the night that often. She has the same dumb parents as Alejandro. While we’ve done much better on the sleep training front, it’s still so hard to let her cry. Why does listening to a baby cry for twenty minutes seem much harder than “just” getting out of bed to return a pacifier? I don’t know. Sleep-addled habits don’t die.

So that, my friends, is why I’m crawling into December. I’m trying to keep up with a two-foot tall wobbler and a three-foot tall teenager.

And it’s winter. Shouldn’t we all be hibernating?

Please?