Tim turns twelve

Tim turned twelve years old yesterday. It is always such a joy to me to celebrate the kids’ birthdays with them. I feel such a sense of accomplishment on their behalf as I watch them reach each new age. It’s not that the birthday itself is an accomplishment, of course; just that it’s such a convenient time to note what’s changed in the past year.

What’s changed for Tim is that he’s grown a lot taller – still wiry as ever – and his facial structure is stronger in appearance, solid bones emerging to define his features. What else has changed is that he grows increasingly confident as a student, as a baseball player, and in my opinion as a mensch. He seems to try to be a good friend to people and expect them to like him in turn. When he was younger, I found him to be somewhat defensive around new peers – as if always expecting them to break his toys – but these days I think he takes a much more circumspect view. In just one week of school so far this year, he’s mentioned two different boys who are new to town and whom he already likes, and I sense that he is learning to appreciate and take an interest in new people rather than viewing them suspiciously. This is a great change, as far as I’m concerned.

Other characteristics of Tim at twelve: he can get lost in a book, just as I used to do – immersed to the point that he doesn’t hear conversation directed at him. He’s a willing and increasingly capable boat captain. I can rely on him for navigational help in the car and for judgment on practical matters. He loves baseball enough to play three seasons a year: not just being at bat or on the pitcher’s mound but even sitting on the bench watching his teammates. He just loves being part of the sport, whether they’re winning or losing, fielding or batting, playing or resting. He tries hard to be a patient and caring older brother, though admittedly those efforts vary in their success rate.

There were only two things he wanted for birthday presents this year, he told us: a text package added to his cell phone (we gave him the phone last year as a hand-me-down, not because it was something he cared much about having but because in fifth grade he started walking or biking home from school sometimes and it was helpful to be in touch); and a waffle iron.

We added the text package over the weekend, and already Tim has used it to become more responsible if also a little more demanding. “Please put a bagel in the toaster for me,” he texts me from the end of the driveway as he gets off the bus. Still, when I texted back asking him to close the pasture gate so that I wouldn’t have to head out later in the afternoon to do it, he closed it even before coming inside for the bagel. So the texting has potential to benefit all of us.

Holly heard Tim’s second wish and asked me if I would buy a waffle iron for her to give him. She and I together stopped in the housewares section at Sears last weekend to pick one out. “I am not giving you a waffle iron,” she told him a dozen or so times in the ensuing days, determined with utter lack of subtlety to be sure this present was a surprise. I’m not so sure it was a surprise, but Tim was definitely happy with it. I don’t know where his obsession for learning to make waffles came from, but I’m willing to give it a try.

In a hundred different ways, he is such a different person from the seven-pound baby I balanced in the crook of my arm for the first time twelve years ago last night. In other ways, not. Traits that emerged in infancy and maintain themselves on the crest of the teenage years include his capacity for stubbornness, his tendency toward introversion, his adoration of Rick, his understated but persistent affection for me.

Most of us parents love our babies from the moment we first see them, and I was no different. But it was so different twelve years ago from how it is now. Then, I loved the very fact of his existence. Now, I love everything about who he is turning out to be. And I feel very, very grateful for the best twelve years, and hopeful that many more equally fascinating, rewarding, and yes, occasionally frustrating, years lie ahead.