My Boy, My Teenager

My apartment is quiet, the kids and their mom have left .The cake is half gone, the dishes are in the dishwasher, and the rubbish is stuffed full of used wrapping paper. We just finished celebrating my oldest son's birthday today. He is thirteen.

For some reason this feels like a landmark birthday...that something has ended and something else is about to begin. I remember him this time last year. Then I had a big boy. Now I have a young man. Watching him navigate through the school yard at pick up time or through a maze of friends and teammates at his basketball games I am impressed by is poise and his confidence. While only occasionally does he feels entitled, I cannot blame him for feeling that the world is his oyster.

After he was born I remember taking him to the window and showing him the early morning Boston skyline and introducing him to the world. It feels like yesterday and a million years ago all at the same time when he would follow me around the yard as I did yard work and we would go for rides in the old Subaru on Saturday mornings. I miss the little boy he was, I enjoy the teenager before me, and I look forward to knowing the man that he will someday become.