Time is that it was not long ago I held you as an infant, but it feels so long ago to think of you without teeth, without words, without your strut. I am incoherently, passionately and devotedly yours, in love with you from the smallest particle of your body to the intangible of your soul. I sleep with your body next to mine, often pressed between my breasts, feet tucked in the hollow of my thighs. You breath quick little breaths randomly, in some dream. You nurse possessively, one hand milking the cow, the other across the unused breast. My chest is riddled with the chicken scratches of your pinching. You are at work with me, in the car with me, in bed with me, in the bath. You and I are still coming apart, a process began at your birth. I would chop off my arms and legs to save your life. I would clean the bathroom every weekend and fold laundry every day to make your home. I do my best and when it does not feel good enough, I fumble and cry and fight until I find a way to do better. I think you are the smartest, funniest, cutest, most interesting, sweetest and best baby there ever was. These are the things about you in your 13th month of life:
You walk like George Jefferson, with your arms at your side, hands cocked backward, fingers curled up, and a strut in your legs. I often hum the Jefferson's theme song when you are toddling around. Sometimes we say Oh here comes Mr. Jefferson! when you peacock in a room. Man, you've got swagger.
You sign for 'more', for 'all done' and for tootsies (nursing). Your sign for tootsies is THE CUTEST THING EVER. You pat your little chest with both of your hands. That's it. But it breaks my heart in the best way.
You say these words: Momma, Dadda, Lola, Dakota, Ian (you try!),Ever, woof woof, tootsies (nursing), all done, and good girl.
You began saying 'good girl' every time we buckled you in your carseat, and I realized it was because you always hold up the buckle for us to pop the clasp into, and we always say 'good girl!' in a certain intonation, so you began telling yourself so. Now you say 'good girl' in that same intonation whenever you are doing something you think is good, or when you are doing something you know is bad. It cracks me up.
You eat avocado, tomato, veggie sticks, chicken, fish, soft carrots, yogurt and bananas. You prefer boobs.
You adore your sister like no other at the moment. You scored the big sister lottery with Lola. She is only a small notch below my devotion to you. When we pick you up from school every day, you yell 'Looooola' the whole way there, and when you see her running down the hill, you laugh out loud in delight. You hug her with both arms around her neck and your face pressed into hers. You follow her everywhere, and she looks for you to be following. She carries you and sits you on her lap. She shares everything with you, even things she swore she wasn't going to. She lets you drag her American Girl dolls by their hair out of there carefully made beds on the floor, and poke at their fake eyelashes. She calls you 'Kinny'. She is the one, the only one, who could get you over your fear of our new bathtub in the new condo. Finally one night you sat on her lap in the tub and laughed and let me wash you without crying. She now asks to bathe you every night. She asks to sleep next to you, and when a friend sat next to you in the car over the weekend, she almost had a little fit- VERY unlike Lola. She sings to you, she dresses you, she makes you laugh when you are crying, sometimes she makes you cry because you are happy playing and she picks you up. She feeds you, she shares every treat with you, she spends more time playing with you than her toys or her friends.
You DO have two different color eyes, to answer the question we get everywhere we go, after they exclaim ' Oh what beautiful eyes! ' One eye is blue, like Momma, and one eye is hazel, like Daddy.
Lola and I have two songs we sing to you all the time. One is the song Oh Christmas Tree, but with the words Oh Everkins. We even do the high voice part. Every time. The other is the classic Asian tune that we sing ' kinny kin kin kin kin kin ' We also sing ' My kinny went over the ocean / my kinny went over the sea / my kinny went over the ocean / oh bring back my kinny to me ' ... you get the idea. We sing all of these daily. Very daily.
You just found your vagina today. Congratulations! As Sarah Silverman would say, ' your pussy is magic. ' And now you know your mother has a sailor mouth and a dirty sense of humor.
Lola decided at age 3 that our vaginas are called 'niney' and our butts are called 'buttina' and a gross smelling fart is a 'sewer smoothie'. So yeah.
Your ears smell DELICIOUS. Lola calls earwax ' wax sacks '. You can see what you are up against in this family.
Your dirty feet smell DELICIOUS. You think it's hilarious when I sniff them and shriek 'ewwwww'
You boss our gigantic dogs around. You aren't as tall as them, but you push them out of the way, or pet them, depending. It's really cute. They lick your face and sometimes accidentally knock you over with their big fat butts.
You just cried a little sobby cry in your sleep right now. Sniff.
In case you missed it, Momma loves you. Momma loves you. Momma loves you.
