Heaven To Me

Jonathan's babyhood is wearing off, one step at a time. Of course, it happens all too naturally, all too inexorably, and of course other people try to speed up the process by saying things like, "He won't be a baby much longer!" or "Do you have him toilet trained yet?"

Does it have to be such a race? We have passed the hurdles of rolling over, sitting up, crawling (although for the longest time it looked like he had invented a new mode, "budging" we called it: he hauled himself forward on his forearms, and pushed a little with his toes), then standing. After that, the hurdles began to blur. As he got strong enough to stand up and hold it, he already was holding something in each hand while doing so. The only reason he dropped his burdens was to climb. So in effect, Jonathan was walking vertically before he struck out on the horizontal. He had five siblings who were right there to take his tiny hands and walk the baby, too. And it has been like that, everything on fast forward, ever since. Landon's tricycle has become Jonathan's "vroom-vroom" and although he cannot quite keep his feet in touch with the pedals at full extension, someone is bound to make up for it by pushing the trike with him on it, roaring around the circuit of kitchen-diningroom-office-hall-back to kitchen at breakneck speed. It puts me in mind of Jonathan's fascination with all automobiles, whether the tractor, street traffic, or the skidsteer...and I pray to Almighty God that I am not raising a someday stock car race driver.

He has cut twenty teeth to date, and outgrown two pairs of shoes since I began putting them on him. His hair has been cut several times, in that 'little man' style that makes me swoon and tear up at the same time.
We stopped nursing a while back, and if it was tough for him, he doesn't know how tough it was for me. I still don't mind that his ideal, at-rest position is curled against me with his lefthand, two-fingers plug in his mouth, and his right hand hooked in my neckline.

He continues to add words to his expression, and this evening, you'd have laughed and cried, to hear him trotting about the house piping, "Ha-we-woo-ya!" (Hallelujah) At least, you would have, if you're anything like me.

I had a chance to get Jonathan a bath tonight, while Jeffrey had taken the rest of the children out on an errand. (A part that he needs for some piece of farm equipment had been left out for him to pick up after hours.) So we went upstairs and put him into the bubbles, for once, and he had a blast while I watched. He thought I was tidying up all around the bathroom, but while he was in soaking, I was soaking it all up. He discovered his toes under the bubbles, got some bubbles into his eye, and pulled at his hair to remind me to wash that, too. I let him stay in long enough that when I finally asked, "Do you want to get out, now?" he actually jumped up and let me take him. And I am so good at this part: I always have the biggest, softest towel laid out across my lap, ready to wrap up against the air. In half a second nothing of him is visible except his head, which I am rubbing with a hand towel until the hair is quite dry - it is pretty chilly upstairs in our old house. Then we dry him off, from the toes up. And we rub in lotion. We count the toes, making sure none have been lost; we make sure nothing was hiding in his tummy button, clean his ears and whisper, "Jesus loves you" in one and "Mama does, too" in the other, and when I say, "Arms up, so Mama can dry!" he falls for it every time. In pretty short order, then, we get down to business and layer him up for a winter sleep in his fresh diaper, onesie, socks and fuzzy sleeper. Sliding the zipper all the way up, his grin starts as I get nearer and nearer to the chin. "Don't worry, Jonathan, I'm not going to tick - Oops! I couldn't help it -
Tickleeeeeee!" "heheheeheheheee Mama teeeeee!"

I had him suspended in my arms, leaning over the crib just to grab the quilt for wrapping, and just for good measure he pointed one imperious, chubby finger at the rocking chair. Bubbles and fuzzy sleeper were working their wiles on him, and he murmured, "Maaamaa." So we sat in the rocker, which creaks a litle. He settles against my chest, two left fingers (always the first and second) in his mouth, head against my heart, and he falls asleep listening to the first sound he ever heard, back when his world was dark water and a mysterious, enveloping presence. I have to resettle my back a couple of times, to get to where the old wooden rocker creaks the most soothingly. Jonathan is still a perfect size for my arms to go all the way around, and seated like that, as his weight leans in, still he isn't heavy. He is no burden, and it would be no trouble to hold him thus for some hours.

This, to me, is heaven on earth.