My son, let’s call him Monkey for the sake of clarity, is a swell kid.  Every parent says that, so you have to take my word for it that he really is one of the better ones out there.  And why wouldn’t you?  You’ve read this far, so it must be true.

He’s just a bit over a year old, and Monkey #2 is already on the way, but more about that later on.

Let’s fill in some basics on Monkey.  He isn’t walking yet.  He’s got a limited vocabulary, and it’s mostly centered on “hungry”, “more”, and “milk”, all in sign.  He’s definitely an observer, not a jumper-in-er.  It’s strange to think back on this, but even as a tiny infant he just seemed too aware, more so than most kids.  Really, even taking my biased opinion into account.  I’m not saying he’s a genius or anything, although he may be for all I know, I’m just saying that he really takes his time to take it all in before deciding on a course of action.

He’s a Virgo, and they’re probably all like that.  He’s also a Rat under the Chinese Zodiac, so he also fits that profile.

What else?  He’s got big eyes and long lashes, not at all like me, but like his Mother.  Come to think of it, she’s more of an observer than me as well.  He goes to daycare 5 days a week, and it breaks his Mother’s heart each and every day he has to go.  But more on the challenges for the middle class later.  There’s something to that, the heart-break of day care.  I don’t like it, but I see it as a necessary evil, so it doesn’t tear me up to drop him off every morning.

The part that bothers me is not knowing what happened during the day.  What exactly did he eat?  How much?  Did he poop?  I know, that last one is kind of weird, but it turns out that now, as a parent, the excretion habits of someone else have taken on a real measure of importance.  

Of course I ask the day care lady about this, but it’s not enough detail.  Even being told “Yes, he did poop today” is sometimes not enough, it makes me feel as though I shouldn’t have had to ask, I should have been able to eyeball him and think “Oh, yes, he looks as though he’s pooped recently”.  But enough about that.

What else?  Monkey’s very first, actual, word was “Yoko”, although if you want to get technical about it it sounds more like Koko.  For the sake of clarity, I’ll tell you that our dog’s name is Yoko.  So that was it, not Mama or Dada or ball, it was Yoko.

And I hate that dog.