better together

Mama: When we get home we’re going to have teriyaki chicken for lunch. You’re favorite!

Diego: NOOOOOO!!!!!! I don’t want yucky chicken.

Mama (not getting it yet): But you love teriyaki chicken.

Diego: I DON’T WANT YUCKY CHICKEN!!!!! I want CLEAN chicken!!!!

A few hours later at dinner:

Diego (about to eat some pork ribs): Is THIS yucky chicken?

While cleaning up before bed…

Diego: Look! I found a coiny! (pointing at a penny on the floor).

Today was a great day.

Wow. It seems like just yesterday that I sat here typing Diego’s letter for his second birthday and yet, nearly 6 months have gone by, we have added dear Enzo to our family and Diego has grown up so much that I hardly remember the toddler he was when last I wrote. I want to be a regular blogger – and have been good about journaling intermittently in the past but can’t seem to steal the moments to do justice to my fantastic family life. Never have I had more to write about! Our family life has just gotten better and better since Enzo’s arrival. Marco and I are much more in tune with each other – family decisions are much less stressful – and we can focus our energy on raising our happy healthy boys without succumbing to as many silly arguments.

So many funny things are sprouting from Diego’s mouth these days – he keeps us in constant laughter. His new favorite phrase is, “I have a good idea.” He then elaborates, ending with, “is dat a good idea, DaDa, is dat a good idea?” I could listen to him speak night and day. His 2 1/2 year old accent sounds a little like he is from Brooklyn, a little Mexican and occasionally British. I haven’t the slightest idea where it all comes from! His imagination is astonishing – he tells long involved stories, some of which start out with, “Once upon a time, in a land far away when Nana was a little boy….” Priceless!

Enzo laughed for the first time 3 days ago. Like everything he does, it was a little understated but no less delightful. He is a mellow little guy that is constantly charms me with his beguiling smile. He is content to sit and watch family life unfold in front of him and, of course, especially likes to watch his older brother play and carry on. He has a hard time sleeping in the early mornings, waking up every hour after 1am, making me feel a little delirious from sleep deprivation. I hate letting him sleep in the swing all the time yet that is the only place he seems to get any prolonged rest. I have visions of him as an 18 year-old sleeping poorly unless he is in a car or on a plane or on some futuristic perpetual motion machine. I know, logically, that he is only 2 1/2 months old and this is only a phase but the little voice inside my head is repeatedly telling me that I’m enabling a miniature insomniac!

“You see what?,” I ask Diego.

“Tash.”

“You see that?”

“No. It tash, Mama.”

“It’s that?” (At this point I cannot for the life of me come up with anything other than lame “that” to try and understand what he’s pointing out.)

“Tash, Mom, TASH!”

“I’m sorry, Diego, I don’t understand what your trying to tell Mama.”

“It garbage, Mama.”

“OHHH, you see trash!”

Thank God my two year old already gets the concept of synonyms!

Two days later…

Dada: Should we put 10 gallons or 15 gallons of gas in the Subaru, Diego?

Diego: Ummmmm, 15.

Dada: Why should we put 15 gallons in?

Diego: 15 moe than 10 gallons.

Where did this kid come from?

Bizarre is an understatement for what is happening today. Both my Mom and Dad were picked up by ambulances and taken to UCD Med… That was strange but even stranger is that they are really, really sick and that for the first time I had to discuss advance directives with the cardiologist today. I was not very close with them for many years, but have been for a few lately and even then I am at a loss for feelings…there are moments when emotions abound and I feel a lot of sadness and guilt for not being there to share life, an then there are moments when the practical side of me takes over and thinks that it is simply the cycle of life: be born, live life, die; and don’t worry about the process. I feel sad because I think about my grandma and my experience with her dying and don’t want to go thru that again… At least not anytime soon. I also think about my son Diego and how I wish for him to enjoy his abuelos for many years to come. Diego especially loves my Dad, he is his whole world when they are together. So I know for sure my Dad is being admitted to the ICU and my Mom to cardiology; and I will have to split my time between them… Truly strange/bizarre.