Weekly Chronicle February 4, 2007

Henry and I have a daily ritual that looks something like me getting ready for the day in front of the bathroom mirror and Henry trying on my "shoesies," flipping the closet light switch, on and off, on and off, on and off...and generally disturbing the order of the ten foot radius surrounding me. The other day he emerged from the closet, demonstrating his usual regard for social norms, looking like this. He took one admiring look in the mirror, turned back to face me and jubilantly exclaimed, "So cute hat on!" I blush burningly at the admission of the following fact: the lacy adornment on my son's head is...(how to put this tactfully???) special occasion underwear. And yes, I took a picture. Would you expect any different from the woman who took a snapshot before rescuing her child from the confines of the toilet? I take my maternal responsibility, to preserve these priceless moments, very seriously.

That is exactly what I was doing one evening this week, knowing Nate wouldn't be home until late, when I decided to video tape Henry in the bath. I thought it would be nice for Nate, who hadn't seen his child for three days, to at least be able to soak up some of Henry's cuteness through the play-back screen on our JVC camcorder. When Nate rolled in, we rolled the tape. It was cute and fun and we smiled and aw-ed, until the bath footage stopped and the last half of Christmas 2006 abruptly started playing. I was in such a hurry to start recording Henry's bath that I failed to check the position of the tape and successfully recorded over half of our holiday footage. I have since been released from the family film making committee, and am only allowed to use the still camera under adult supervision.

I nearly talked myself out of publishing this post. I kept thinking of the almost certain fact that my father and my grandmother would read it and just about saved this one for the private family volume...but that seemed awfully selfish. So...sorry, dad. I know you don't want to read about my "special occasion undergarments." But if it's any consolation, your grandson's the only one wearing them!