Paul is Dangerous

I see a ton of myself in him. But Paul is also himself quite unique. My son is awesome and I love spending little glimpses of time with him, just the two of us.

Sometimes his shyness comes off as being obstinate. When he’s backed into a corner he squirms away. When everyone stares at him he drops to the floor. He has an amazing vocabulary and imagination if only you are patient enough to activate it. You can confuse his knowing exactly what he wants with stubbornness. For his age, he has an incredible attention span. He is thoughtful. He is polite despite what his daddy teaches. He loves being physical, punching and wrestling and climbing are some of his favorite things. He’s pretty good with a computer. He can navigate where he wants with the family iMac, google to search for things, remember all his passwords, master tons of games, and still dominate on Wii. Just ask Tom and Tim who witnessed Paul nonchalantly bowl 220 in Wii bowling. Paul fascinates me with his complexity. But in the end he is fairly simple, like all complex people. Meet his basic needs and he’s good to go. Food 24 hours per day, a computer, and his mommy is all he needs to survive.

I’ve been telling him lately that he is brave and fierce and dangerous. He likes that a lot. Recently, Cathy  (from YS) gave me a copy of The Dangerous Book for Boys to give to Paul. When I last came back from San Diego Paul looked at it, then I told him the title on the cover and his eyes got huge. He snatched it from my hands and ran off to his bedroom to read it. Of course, he’s 4– but he read it in the way a 4 year old reads. Every once in a while he’ll tell me, “Did you know my book teaches me how to hunt rabbits?” “Did you know?” On and on he tells me of the adventures he will have.

I love going on junior adventures with Paul. Tonight he and I escaped for some “man time” to the park. While we were riding our bikes he and I were dreaming of climbing the high ladder on the fire engine. (They were testing it or something.) We talked about being brave when he rounded corners. We talked about falling and how much fun that can be. We talked about bugs and spiders. 

Paul is dangerous. I think burned on the heart of every young man is a deep desire for adventure. Every young boy wants to do things a little dangerous. I’m just thankful I get to be here for him. And I can’t wait for the adventures we’ll have tomorrow.