Happy 20th Birthday To Number One Son!
Dear Number One Son,
We can’t believe how quickly time has flown and how incredible you are. It has been 240 months since you appeared on the scene. Although you refused to show up on New Years Day… You caused us to sit in the hospital for 18 hours starting on New Years Eve… (“Happy New Years Sweetheart… Have an ice chip!”)… But You were a beautiful baby, despite the horrible photo taken of you in the hospital – the photo we didn’t mail to family with your birth announcements because we didn’t want to worry them or prompt them to obtain unnecessary genetic testing.
It did concern us that your sole focus during most of your childhood seemed to be food. You demanded cereal in your bottles at only six weeks. (Or at least that’s when we caught on. You’ll have to forgive the delay, we were horribly sleep deprived what with not having slept AT ALL for, oh, about SIX WEEKS.)
When you were two and leaned against the space heater and branded yourself … Your mother thought you were retarded because you didn’t cry. I, on the other hand thought I’d given rise to a young superhero. Your uncles sure treated you like a superhero though. Thanks to your uncle the Limo driver… You showed up to day care and kindergarten in a stretch limousine more often than not.
Even though you got held back in kindergarten (“Whaaa!”)… You eventually tested out to the “gifted” level… (Whew!)… But not until we found out you needed coke bottle glasses.
We thought you’d have a weak stomach due to the fact that you threw up in almost every decent restaurant in town before you were seven. The fact that you came over and doctored up my pot of chili to 3 alarm status a couple of days ago disproves that theory.
You were such a great little kid. So goofy and silly, and so much fun to be with. You still have a wonderful sense of humor and I love how you can make us all laugh. You have always been a joy to be around, except for a few times, a lot of times between grades 8 and 12.
You weren’t so much fun during your last year of high school especially… But you proved me wrong and handed me the diploma with a sly grin on your face. (You still think we don’t know about the bet you had with you best bud about who could graduate dead last in your class!)
But… this last year has been a joy. It took us a little (long) while to figure out why you wouldn’t go to the State University that had accepted you without reservation on the strength of your SAT scores alone… But you played to your strengths and signed up for community college so you could work. After all… How many 18 year olds get to be full fledged IT managers right out of high school?
We argued when you turned 18 and you moved out. Your mom wanted to kill me and we waited up lots of nights to see if it would be police or ambulance that showed up with the bad news… (Well… I wanted to sleep)… but if mama’s not happy … No one is happy. But no cops… No coroners and you’ve never showed up on the doorstep with a sob story. So… What’s a few gray hairs between pals, right?
You have grown up to be a terrific young man and it has been a pleasure watching you transform from cute-as-a-button baby to sweet toddler to adorable little boy to surly teen to surly slacker and now, to a mature and impressive guy. We have loved you SO FREAKING MUCH at every age and stage. You’re the best.
Happy Birthday, Bub!
We love you more than you will ever know.
Mom & Dad