Liam is Nine!

Nine years ago this day, I was holding a very small boy in my arms. His hair was the color of champagne, a blonde I'd never seen before, with a silvery cast. His head was the size of a Delicious apple. His hair is still white-blonde. His head is bigger now, and stuffed with thoughts.
Saturday, we celebrated his birthday. I arose at 5 AM to begin wrapping presents, baking his cake, and straightening the house. Liam and Phoebe helped me bake the cake--they're trying to get egg cracking and using the mixer down these days--and clean up the house. The weather was glowery and cold, but I decided that the first thing we would do would be to take a good hike. Maybe it would burn off some of the almost unbelievable ya-yas that five 8-year-old boys generate when they are together. If there were a way to harness that energy to some purpose other than total chaos...But then they wouldn't be 8-year-old boys.
Barely contained chaos.Phoebe just towers over them at 5'3". My gosh, she's within a couple of inches of towering over me. It's not fair that she got the willowy gene. Managed to get them lined up on a log like little wood ducks.
Ethan cracked me up. He wouldn't smile; he looked like he was posing for a Polo spread. "I'm used to not smiling," was his laconic answer when I ribbed him about it.

On the way back, Liam's introspective side came out, and he let the other boys rampage far ahead as he dropped back to walk quietly with me. "Don't you want to catch up with your friends?" I asked, just making sure. "That's OK. I want to walk with you. Thanks for my birthday, Mommy."
In the meadow, we checked our little persimmon tree, that came up a few years ago in the middle of a clump of sumac. The fruits we'd been watching eagerly all fall were finally ready to taste.That is, they'd frozen solid a couple of times and were mellow enough not to make our throats close up and our tongues fuzz out. At least not too much. I tied into a handful with little groans of pleasure. Liam liked them at first, but the bitter aftertaste was too much for him.I have to say, he's a game little guy, and he'll try anything once. But there's no mistaking this look. "What did you feed me?"Soon enough, we were back home, and it was time to open presents and blow out the candles on his butter cake with bittersweet chocolate icing.
He somehow got the idea that he'd turn nine when he blew out the candles on his cake. So here he is, turning nine.

After cake, we repaired to the stairs to throw water balloons off the towertop.

The culmination of the party was throwing a large whole pumpkin off the towertop. I did the honors, mostly so it wouldn't land on the roof, and because at that point in my day I needed to throw a pumpkin off the tower. The sound it made when it hit the ground 50' below--a muffled SBBBBLLLLOOOOOOPPPPBBBTTT!!! was the most exhilarating thing I have heard in a long, long time, and the perfect anodyne for having planned and executed a boy party. They loved it too and we all cracked up and high-fived.

When everyone had gone, Phoebe and Liam set to excavating Liam's new "I Dig Dinosaurs" kit. Some clever person got the idea to encase a jumbled up plastic skeleton in a block of coarse grit, and give a kid a chisel and hammer with which to chip out the prize. Genius, if a bit messy. This is the kind of toy that would have caused my mother to deliver a barnyard animal on the kitchen floor. Grit and sand were flying everywhere. I banished them to the guest room, spread newspapers, and resolved to vacuum it out of the carpet when they were all done. Big deal. The cheesy little chisel and hammer were too delicate, so we got busy with a real wood chisel and a screwdriver. That made it go a bit faster. They worked peacefully together, chiseling away, until almost two hours later they emerged with a complete Tyrannosaur in their proud little hands. Phoebe did the gross excavation and Liam did the detail work.

Bacon was so tired from chasing little boys that he fell into a dreamlike stupor, sucking on what remains of his Vo-Toys Gigantic Fullback (one of the best toys he's ever had, and one I must replace this Christmas).
Happy birthday, sweetest Liam. You're growing up so fast, changing every day--you won't be my little boy much longer. Know that I treasure every moment with you. There never was a sweeter Shoomie.
photo by Ric MacArthur