Patrick, At Five

Patrick John Edward went to the doctor yesterday.  He was so excited.  He was so happy to see her.  He was so cooperative and thorough in answering her questions ("I don't think I'm allergice to any medicine, but I am allergic to grass.")  And then came the shots.  Four shots, two in each leg, and my mild-mannered, sensitive, smart-mouthed little boy turned into a red-faced, sweating, screaming little devil.  Thank God shots don't take long.  I left that office sweating myself.  (Fast-forward several hours, and the poor kid could barely walk upstairs because his legs hurt so badly.  Ouch.)

But as we drove away, his tears had dried, he had thanked the nurse and doctor for taking care of him, and he admitted that they really didn't hurt that bad, but he didn't like people holding him down.  I can understand that.  (Secretly, I'm happy he has such a fight in him.  I didn't even know it was there.) 

Patrick has changed so quickly from a funny little toddler to a very clever and wide-vocabularied little boy.  He's inquisitive and smart, the memory of an elephant.  He so perfectly grew into the little boy we imagined that he would be.  He's a tiny clone of his father, keeping score of everything and everybody, forgiving but not forgetting. 

I wonder when the day will come when I look at him and just accept who he is as normal, not the oh-so-special, my-goodness-how-did-I-get-so-lucky way I see him now.  His whole life is going to be wonderful (maybe a little rocky when he starts high school if he doesn't grow very much; he's kind of tiny for his age), but wonderful nonetheless.  He's a special boy.  He knows it, and that's a good thing.  Nobody that special should be kept in the dark about it.