To my son in the throes of youth

 Reading: You Could Make This Place Beautiful by Maggie Smith

Listening to: "Relaxing Jazz for Autumn" 

Outside: Crows and leaves swirl in the wind

Indiana, post-hot chocolate, finds an incredible stick
October 22, 2025

The second of two, the last in line. The Pandemic baby - born and raised in isolation, finding his feet in a big, wide world. He's momentum, brightness, and intensity. I look for myself in him, gazing at his face as one would look in a mirror - this ever-changing reflection of our shared past. 

I zip him into his coat, knowing he won't need help for much longer. 

I read his bedtime story, marvelling at the size of him, how he's starting to outgrow his toddler bed, how his five-year-old gaze follows my finger when I'm pointing to the sounds that make up the words, "zoom" and "so," and knowing he knows them. Now he knows them. 

I catch myself calling him by his big sister's name sometimes, by accident, as if she's living her wonder years all over again. Perhaps, I'm wishing she could. Perhaps, through him, she is.

First trip to the Barber Shop
October 29, 2025

Dear son, lover of the colour pink, expert at "doing voices," hard worker at school and provider of laughter at home, may you always sparkle. 

Keep saving the bugs that want saving. Keep thanking the bees for the honey we put in our porridge. Yes, cry when you see someone chopping down a tree. Every time. Feel deeply. May such empathy never run out. Keep making inventions out of tape and pipe cleaners. Your inventions just get better and better. You're improving the world every day.

Bonfire Night celebrations
November 2, 2025

And just know, if I happen to stand at the kitchen door just a little too long, and the pan boils over, it's okay. It's because, while you're watching ever more fireworks from the evening's living room window - you, perched on the back of the couch, mouth agape, your face a little glazed globe of wonder - to me, that fizzing poetry, that swirling stardust rocketing across the darkness in all colours - parrot-red, electric-blue, honey-yellow, Halloween-green - all that explosive light-splashed brilliance at the window isn't the fireworks. No, not at all. It's you.