The miracle is growing up already.

Spent the afternoon and evening at D. and J.'s home this evening. Very enjoyable. "Our" little miracle is doing well. Growing, even. Oh, yeah, right. Big surprise. Well, the truth is, he's impressive in a lot of ways. Granted, as I've said before, I don't have kids so I'm no genius about children but from what I keep seeing, I'm impressed.

Okay, I've seen the videos before. It always seems like the usual baby is born pretty much purple and slimy. I was a little surprised to see that R. was born more "normal" looking. Not looking like a science experiment. Or a space alien. Looked rather like a kid three weeks old.

Now, I'm the oldest of 10 kids. Strange or not, I helped raise the last 6 of them. No kidding. Changed diapers, fed, bathed. The works. No it was NOT cool but I did it.

So, fast forward to today. Little R. is notably ahead of his class. Start with the fact that he was born looking pretty much 3 weeks or so ahead of his time. Way cool. He is exceptionally strong. Indeed, his legs actually have definition already. Very impressive, to say the very least. I'm actually blown away. He seems to be coordinated. That's to say that when he moves his arms, he appears to move them deliberately and with control rather than just thrashing around.

He follows things with his eyes, even from a distance. He's feeding really well. His eyes have taken on a beautiful hazel color. His face is exceptionally expressive and he passes his face through a lot of motions. Sometimes he appears to smile but we all know he's too young to smile at us. Isn't he? Hmmmmmmmmm.........

I'm utterly captivated by him. I spent the week at work trying to figure out ways to get to come over and visit him and hold him. Hell, I'm a macho man (I think) and I want to be with this little guy. Funny thing is, Thursday I was thinking, "Hey! Tomorrow's Friday and we can go over there after work! Cool!" No sooner had I thought that than one of my buddies called to remind me that I had a prior engagement for Friday evening.

Damn, damn, damn, damn, damn.

We were at our event last night and it was VERY enjoyable. But the whole time I was there, I kept thinking, "This is VERY enjoyable! I wish we could go and visit R." So, this morning, I reshuffled some things and we struggled all day, holding off the urge to come and visit him before D. and J. were ready to have us over. That was tough. I spent the morning at the local computer super store wasting time, just to divert my thoughts. Self-defense.

I'm still feeling somewhat changed by all this. D. and J. were more than generous to us, inviting us to be a part of this perfect event. R. is now a part of our life. We're not his parents, to be sure, but still, my mind dwells on him constantly. I love holding the little guy and watching him. I love seeing him interact with his mother and his father.

Thanks to digital cameras, there are more pictures of him from the past week than there were of me my entire life! But for every moment we capture in a photo, there are 10,000 more we wish we could grab. And for every word I write here about my feelings on this most miraculous of things, there are 100,000 which could be written and still only describe the thousandth part of what I'm feeling.

The words aren't there for me yet.

Hopefully, they will come.

--Wag--