Falling Behind

Frustrated right now because I meant to be somewhere else, running a fun errand or two for myself before starting work, but I ran out of time and can't do it now without risking making myself late... maybe Thursday. Hopefully Thursday, since one important thing I want to do is get a gift for my nephew's upcoming birthday. He will be 14 on Sunday.

14. A teenager. It doesn't seem possible that time has moved so quickly. I remember (vividly) when Col was a babe in his proud parents' arms, smiling shyly at everyone, charming everyone around him. I remember when he was toddling but still not talking, fascinated by keys and telephones... especially the afternoon my brother and I watched amused as he set about "locking" every door in the house, including a hallway closet.

"But why that door, sweetie?" I asked him, playfully. "That's just a storage closet, ya know?" He paused to look at me as though considering my question. In that moment my brother--his dad--and I must have had the same thought: if this were a cartoon there would be, in reply, a thought balloon over Colin's head.

As if on cue, Joe provided it. "Things... come out at night," he intoned and we cracked up as Colin grinned.

His other big thing was "talking" on the telephone. Col had a toy phone that had begun to lose its appeal as he noticed his parents taking incoming calls on the wireless grown-up phones around the apartment. So his parents gave him an old, cordless powder blue princess phone and we made a great game of answering it for him when it "rang" asking if he wanted the call or should "they" call back, and then handing him the receiver.

"Her-row?" Col would say importantly, his eyebrows up. Then as he noticed us all eavesdropping he'd turn away slightly and lower his voice to a conspiratorial whisper of garbled baby-babble. I don't think the word "cute" properly describes how sweetly hilarious it always was, but I suppose it will have to do until a better one comes along. And as ever, I'm swept with regret that no one thought to record priceless moments like that... how is it possible that not one of us in that loving circle of grandparents, aunts and uncles had the presence of mind to get a camcorder going?

I remember crisp, sunny days like this one when a pre-school Col, his affectionate black lab Baker and I would wander the neighborhood, searching for Tyrannosaurus Rex bones and the perfect playground (where other little kids were friendly back and you never had to wait your turn for the carousel horse). I miss our Tuesday morning jaunts to the local library for lively read-alongs, and searching Blockbuster shelves for Disney and Land Before Time videos we hadn't seen already a million times, I miss our bookstore trips and joining Dad at The Medici for a quick lunch or a sticky bun snack. I miss backyard games of catch, and watching Little Bear and Magic School Bus episodes with Col, miss putting him down for a nap and reading him a story as he did his best to fight off sleep. I miss... everything.

Now he's taller than me, sounds eerily like his late father on the phone and--last time I saw him anyway--resembles one of the Jonas brothers. I know I sound like my own grandmother saying this, but where on earth did the time go? How could the boy have grown up so fast? And where have I been as he's been doing that?