The Son Also Rises

Before Little Guy was born, I had a number of conversations with Sam and JS about my fear that I couldn't love a boy as I loved my girls.  Sam couldn't even conceive of how it would be different, and I couldn't explain--"I just love their very girlishness." I had no frame of reference for what boyishness would encompass.  On learning we were having a boy, people would say, "Oh, little boys just love their mamas."  (This sounded suspiciously compensatory, and so do little girls, for the record.)

But when he was born--the very moment he was born and I laid eyes on him, I felt this surge of recognition and joy.  I felt my whole heart inflate with love for him, for him exactly as he was.  I'd fully expected to love each of my daughters completely at birth, and I had, and so each moment was unique and full of love: Allison Clare because of my shock that a person had just emerged from my body, Gillian because she was a blessing beyond what I had imagined I could have (a second daughter!), and Joshua because of this flash of, "It's you!" 

Now my boy is growing taller, with the proportions of a person who stands on his own--longer arms and legs, the face of a toddler instead of a baby.  He still looks babyish because he still crawls and he is bald.  But he is clearly beginning to express the will and complex emotions of a toddler.  Recently Gillian was sitting on my lap on the floor, and he saw us from across the room and crawled over to try to push her out of place, grunting with effort and displeasure.  He adores Gillian, but he's getting possessive I guess.

He's the first of our kids to really seem to feel this way, which is probably a result of his being the baby and being given his way by everyone else; the girls fight with each other but if he wants something, they concede pretty quickly to him.  When he really gets in their way, like when they've set up an elaborate tableau and they see him crawling intently in their direction, one of them will start saying "Baby alert!  Baby alert!" or "The giant baby head is coming!" ("Giant baby head" is how their toys refer to Little Guy when various My Little Ponies or princesses speak to one another)  Mostly, it's a monotone, repeated, loud "Baby alert!  Baby alert!" while they rapidly scoop things up and move to higher ground.  We all love this little boy--I can't believe I ever thought my happiness complete without him.