Tuesday, June 06, 2006

"And the sign said long-haired-freaky-people, need not apply..."

My little brother is "graduating" from middle school this weekend...or is it Friday? Suffice to say, I'm gonna save up for the plane fare for his high school graduation...I'm just, yeah, struck, HARD, whenever I realize he's FOURTEEN years old.

I'm trying to see him as a teenager, and not the 3-month old I remember crawling all around the house with his lopsided grin that kinda matched his lopsided head. Or the, tee hee, toddler that Karin made cry when I left them alone for like, a minute? Or the 3-year old who came barreling down the concourse when my parents came to watch me fence in San Louis Obispo. That's a funny memory...

It was a LOOOOOOOONG event, 2 days worth of fencing. Days before I'd cut my waist-length hair to just below my ears. Basically just long enough so I could pull it back into a stubby tail so I wouldn't overheat in the fencing mask. IT WAS HOT. I went outside to get some fresh air and see if maybe my parents were waiting around there...they were about 3 hours late by then. My family is connected by many things, our lack of 20/20 vision is a biggie. I saw clumps of people here and there but no one that looked like my parents.

All of a sudden, from a clump of 4 breaks away a tiny little person, screaming, "NENA! NENA! NENA!" All the way. Counterpoint to his cries was my mother screaming, "Mijo! VENTE AQUI! MIJO! NO CORRAS! MIJO!!!" (Cuz, yeah, he recognized me METERS before all of them with his young healthy eyes :).)

The next thing I know, IMPACT, and a tiny little guy is in my arms looking at me with his head tilted first one way, then the other. Then he solemnly took both his hands and put them on my hair, whose little nub I'd taken out for more air, and ran his fingers through. The shock on his face was rather apparent. I wish I had a picture... But he, of everyone in my family, seemed the worst struck by the loss of my hair.

Now? Ri-i-ight, who cares about some old lady who says she's his sister and lives 1200 miles away? No, not that bad, he's actually a sweet kid. TEMPER problems, but umm, yeah, that would be most teenagers.

Today's title was definitely brought to you by him...he asked for music and I'm providing, but this time I'm trying to gather stuff he asked for. Mostly metal and hard rock, but some of the requests come from the bowels of my own music collection and that's just freaky...(people, need not apply---sorry, it's been in my head for a couple days now...).

This is not the same pudgy little kid I could scoop up and carry around and share my chee-toes with (puffs, yummy).

Urgh...I began this last night and now I gotta go to work...time is not on my side right now...

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

It's funny the memories we have of the little ones in our life. I still see my oldest nephew as a baby, and yet he has his own apartment.

Birdsong said...

What a great thing to save to give him when you attend that high school graduation - writing that is so alive and vivid with him right in the middle (he'll appreciate it by then).