New Eyes

To the Christmas windows, and dash away all!

While Juan and I scurry from place to place during the shortest four weeks of the year, the time between Thanksgiving and Christmas, more often than not Benji is by our side or at the very least in the back seat watching the sprawl and panic of Route 22 as it scours past the car windows.  Not long ago any time not engaged in active play was a candidate for naptime, and we could bring him anywhere, kid-friendly or not, knowing that our sleeping baby wouldn't be traumatized by the messy single's scene in yet another fabulous Manhattan restaurant..Two year old boys, shall we say, are different.

Our little sponge takes it all in.  His calm personality means that we can still take him to noisy, crowded places with a pretty good chance of success...but all one has to do is watch his eyes.  He sees everything, hears everything, reads my mind like a psychic and divines emotions like a shaman.  These days his reactions are ever more to our reactions - looking to us to see how he should respond to that man asking for money (polite and brief), or that waiter trying to pick him up (reluctant acceptance), or the drunk girl who broke yet another glass at next table (his eye roll could read Raja's for filth, oh kay?!)  What's great is that we're actually starting to share emotions with our son.

Of course not all of our emotions are positive, especially for a toddler.  We don't need to dump a day full of stress on him. The slow-motion bulldozer of our recent house sale and purchase is something we try to pass off as "fun", just like my parents did for me all of those - er, not-so-many -  years ago.  House hunting is exciting for him, running through vacant houses, driving around with Daddies, hopefully unaware that we've picked our cuticles until they bled and haven't slept well since June. His beautiful big brown eyes see, for now, what we want him to see: a huge world, full of new and wonderful things, and his two dads by his side showing it off.