Chet Baker is Twelve! His Present is Phoebe.

It's been awhile. There's just something about a ten-day trip, putting 2010 miles on the Subaru, giving three book talks in three states, driving home in one 14-hour go, having one day to unpack, then driving two hours to the airport to pick up Phoebe (YAYYYYYY) after not having seen her for six months, while trying to pick up the house (forget actually cleaning it), getting a handle on Christmas prep (hoping there are still decent trees left on the lot), and shopping (gift certificates are so ehh)

that puts a crimp in the blogmuscle.

By popular demand, here is a video of Chet Baker's ecstatic reunion with his long-lost sister Phoebe, triumphantly returned from San Diego and then Panama. It happened on his TWELFTH BIRFDAY which was 12/12/16!! Oh!!

 She wakes him with a touch, he gets up, says a perfectly acceptable dog hello (in his view, at least), and jumps up to kiss...me. I am not crowing about this. I'm sending him KISS PHOEBE pictures as hard as I can. But The Bacon is a Mether's boy, and the great significance of this homecoming and the importance of supplying to his adoring fans a video of him smothering Phoebe with kisses is simply and sweetly lost on him. That's OK. He's Chet Baker. He's perfeck just as he is.

Fear not. She extracts lovin' from that dog pretty much all day long.

Witness the Boston Terrier Melt: 

No Boston terrier will leave a beloved person unkissed for long. That's his tongue, not hers, although the possibility that it's hers evokes a snort.

Chet is especially amorous at night. He brings his favorite bones to bed, chews a little while, then starts smoochin'. Some of our favorite times are around bedtime, when the kids come in, flop on the bed, and tell stories while Chet gnaws his bones and antlers, then smooches, then chews some more.

  Read whatever you want into his dreamy expression here. Adoration? Forbearance?  He's a blank slate. Also a shameless, newly turned 12, pink pot-bellied piglet.

 Bill captured this classic Homecoming Night shot of Phoebe, Chet and his dratted paparazzi. He's breaking the Third Wall with a look worthy of Jack Benny. Are you getting this, Daddeh? This is ridiculous. Click on the photo for full google-eye glory.

Liam and I drove up to Columbus to retrieve our Panama Princess on Monday, arriving home around midnight. She'd had a 7-hour layover in Miami (Thanks, American Airlines!) when she could have been home eating strawberries and arugula. Ah well, she's home. And it's so wonderful to have her home, here, safe, warm, sleeping a lot, eating all her favorite foods, watching Cupcake Wars and Catfish with Wiam.

On the way up, we stopped at The Anderson's, my favorite store of all. It has everything from bulk peanuts to flowerpots to bathmats to mini-recliners that I'm not going to buy for 6'1" Liam with his Size 12 shoes (on 12/12/16, Chet's 12th birfday!), no matter how he implores. He makes me laugh. I love love love roadtrips with lanky, hilarious Liam. 

There was nobody happier to see Phoebe than Liam, and nobody happier to see Liam than Phoebe. 

This perfect reunion was almost as overwhelming as her luggage. This is the sum total of her possessions for four months in Panama. I couldn't have done it so portably. 

But enough of luggage. I can't stop looking at the love. Phoebe was 3 1/2 when Liam came along. She was old enough to be ready to welcome him, to adopt him, to love him without jealousy and completely without reservation. By the time he was 4 months old, she told me she wanted to marry him. Without going into too much detail, I explained why that wasn't a very good idea, but I assured her that she could love him all her life.

And she does. And he loves her right back.

Phoebe's summer in San Diego, interning at Scripps Institution of Oceanography, and her four months studying and traveling in Panama with a SIT (School of International Training) program, have given us back a changed person. She glows with newfound confidence, independence, and a glorious ferocity. Living, traveling, working and coping with bright, motivated, driven women from all over the U.S has bolstered her confidence in her own powers.  Having homestays with Panamanian families has given her perspective on just how privileged Americans are, and an empathy for the less fortunate that little else could. 

We are grateful and blessed.