Half Full

My cat is a pessimist. He is a "bowl half empty" kind of guy. I know this because almost every morning at about 4:30 am, he meows like crazy to be fed. On most days, this habit of his does not bother me because I get up at that time anyway. On the weekends, however, I tend to get a bit testy when I get to the kitchen, only to find a bowl mostly full, but with a small circle of blue plastic bottom showing through the kibble. This, I have discovered, apparently renders the bowl . . . empty. I suppose it's a cat thing.

It is the boy child's responsibility to feed the cats. He rarely remembers to do so. He rarely gets in trouble for not doing his chores. Someone else always feeds the cats or gives them water. I'm not sure why, but the boy child seems to get away with things the girl child never could. I think it's because, even though he's thirteen, he looks younger. We sometimes cut him more slack. We probably shouldn't. This causes the girl child a great deal of frustration as you might imagine, but since she's an angsty teen, we tend to ignore her. This frustrates her too, but we can't seem to help ourselves. Anyway, the boy child looks younger and even still has some baby teeth. About a year ago he lost a tooth and the girl child, in that way she has, asked, "You don't still believe in the tooth fairy, do you?" The boy child looked her in the eye and replied, "Don't ruin this for me." He was kidding, but at that moment we realized that maybe he had missed a few of the little pleasures of childhood, simply because he had gotten there too late.

At my age, being mistaken for someone younger is a compliment. It makes my day. When I was younger, though, I always wanted to look older. The girl child is often mistaken for someone older, and she thinks it's kind of cool, although not all the time. She was taller than me by the time she was twelve. She looked mature. And, people expected more of her. It was more noticeable when she was younger, when people wouldn't realize that she was still in elementary school and not a hormonally challenged middle school student. She is often reminding people that she is only fifteen, that she has just started high school, that she hasn't experienced some things yet, and that she really isn't ready to. I heave a sigh of relief. The husband and I have considered ourselves extraordinarily lucky that she has a good head on her shoulders, because having a fifteen-year-old that looks twenty-two could have been  something a great deal different from what we have. A mature looking girl child with a knack for Photoshop? What could possibly go wrong?

When I was a teen, I always envied the girls that looked like the girl child. They were all grown up. They had boyfriends. They wore real bras. I was short and skinny and basically built like a ten year old boy. When I was young, clothes for children looked a lot different from clothes for teens and adults. I did not want to wear Danskins anymore, nor did I want to wear Buster Browns. I was a teenager. Seriously. It just wasn't fair. It has not always been easy for me to relate to the issues of the girl child, but I try. She finds certain clothes in her size, like bathing suits, either too matronly or, at the other end of the spectrum, too sexy and mature. In the last few years we have found the stores that might carry the one or two options in between. We hope they stay in business. Otherwise, we might have to  open a store of our own. Call me if you want to invest.

And then there is the boy child. Yesterday afternoon, after realizing that the boy child had outgrown his snow boots, we went to the mall. Nothing like waiting until a blizzard is upon you to try to find snow boots, right? It wasn't easy. Plus, the boy child is on the cusp of child-size and grown-up size. He wants the grown-up styles, of course. He is thirteen. It becomes a treasure hunt. I am ready to spend too much money on something he likes. I don't want to, but I want him to feel comfortable in his clothes. This, I can relate to. This, I understand. We finally find something we can all agree upon at a reasonable price. I thank my lucky stars for Totes.

I have friends that are having babies. I know a few with toddlers. They are adorable. You can dress them up however you like. Well, at least some of them will let you dress them up. I look at my children and they are so big. And smelly. Babies are smelly, too, but in a different way. My kids are so grown up. They talk about sex and drugs and rock ’n’ roll. They go places by themselves. I have to let them go. When they were little, I sometimes caught a glimpse of them as teens. It could be an expression, a phrase, a camera angle that resulted in a vision of what they would look like, who they might become, in just a few years. But now, occasionally, when I'm not paying attention, I catch a glimpse of them as young children again. I watch the boy child with his lego, concentrating on whatever he is building. I see the girl child in her pjs and her glasses, with no makeup, and I see the little girl I knew. I see the boy child and the girl child share a piece of cake, competing for every bite, especially the last one. Sometimes I insist that I get it. I have that power. And I can be a child, too, you know.