When the Stories Were Done

Em calls me “My Daddy” lately. Ummmm, My Daddy? I’m gonna build you a rocket ship today. Ummmm, My Daddy? Who made da Moon? It cracks me up. The Boy is a marvel, he is. He knows his address, his telephone number. He can immediately differentiate between sarcasm and sincerity, irony and fact. I know people who’ve circumvented a lifetime without being able to do that. He’s only three. The little shit actually mocked me recently. It was just hilarious and it garnered my respect in that it was done with perfect timing and no hint of meanness. The kid’s got potential. On Sunday we played with his “building bricks,” the poor man’s Leggos. We meticulously crafted houses and cars and ferris wheels and playgrounds and buildings. We leaned back on our hands and admired our work for several minutes. Then with a beautiful smile and a glint in his eye, he asked, “My Daddy, can I knock it down?” “Of course,” I said. “That’s the really fun part, Boy.” And knock it down he did. Ever the optimists, we built it back again—better. The two of us, gleefully naïve, as if the next Apocalypse was not a mere hand swipe away. (A good hand swipe is just too tempting to pass up.) That night we read The Brave Cowboy, Where the Wild things Are, and Hop on Pop. On every page of Where the Wild Things Are, he’d stop the story to point at each character and tell me, “That’s you, and that’s Mommy, and that’s me, and that’s Uncle Geoff.” Turn page and repeat. When the stories were done, he nestled into the crook of my arm and yawned. Then he looked up and said to me, “I love you, My Daddy.” I looked back at him for a lifetime. Finally I said, “I know, My Boy. I love you too.” It was a good day.