Happy Birthday, son.

Dear Noah,

Happy birthday. You’ve been in our hearts for five years now. You entered into this world full force, crying nonstop when you were born, refusing to sleep, and you’ve not slowed down since. You walked at 8 months, scaled and tiptoed along our narrow rock retaining wall at one, rode a bike with training wheels at two, and without at three. Before you turned four, you swam across a 40-yard pool without stopping.

You’ve climbed boulders in Colorado, played in creeks and stomped through a myriad of puddles. You are easily the fastest kid your age we’ve encountered, and taller than most. Given all this, it’s sometimes easy to forget how young you are. One day, when you were still three, we were complaining about how cranky you were, forgetting we took a bike ride that morning that was nearly six miles. And you pedaled the entire way.

While you have all these raw physical skills, you’re only competitive with yourself. To watch you create one of your “inventions”, and proudly show it off, we can see that your mind works in a creative fashion. When you don’t accomplish what you set out to, we can see the dark clouds move in. You get frustrated and stubborn, refusing help for whatever it is you may be working on. You didn’t talk until you were two, but you learned your alphabet, your numbers and even how to spell a little shortly after. You have one volume - loud. I can tell you to whisper a thousand times, and you whisper, “OK” in acknowledgment, but it lasts no more than a few seconds.

To make you stop at the end of the day, we literally have to lay down with you and make you quit moving long enough to fall asleep. And it never lasts long. Your younger brother will lay in bed for a half hour after he wakes up, talking to himself and lounging around until someone gets him. With you, all we hear is a yawn on the monitor as you first open your eyes, seconds later followed by the hard thump of you jumping out of bed onto the wooden floor to start a new day. One morning, well before it was light outside, I asked you why you were getting up so early. You replied, “Because I’m bored of sleeping.”

I’m tempted someday to throw out my watch and plans, and see just how far you’ll go before stopping on your own. In five years, I’ve never seen it happen, unless you count falling asleep in your high chair during dinner.

Your full steam approach to life is going to create some challenges as we try to properly channel your personality. It will be someone’s full time job to keep you engaged. You love friends, but like me, you make them cautiously and hold them fast. You love your brother, especially when you’re apart, and you’re very protective of him when other kids are around, but my God you can be a pain in his ass when it’s just the two of you. You love your mom and dad, and even though you’re mostly reluctant to give hugs, you surprise us with “I love you’s” out of the blue, hugs that we weren’t expecting, or even more frequently, flowers that you picked for us. Likely out of someone’s garden or a business’s landscaping. You are empathetic towards others; you’re extremely kind to babies and younger kids, and take good care of them.

You know it all, even at this age, and you’re quite defiant at times. You will die on the hill for what you feel is right. If we give you two choices, you will most likely counter with choice number three, and even faced with an ultimatum of “no stories, and immediate bedtime” or some similar consequence, you will cling stubbornly to the unavailable choice.

Your full-on belly laugh is as infectious as any I’ve ever heard, and just hearing it makes us smile, even if it’s because you’re doing something you shouldn’t. You’ve had this same laugh from the time you were a baby, and it hasn’t changed a bit. I watched a video of you laughing at three months old, and it sounds exactly the same as listening to you laugh today. You love to make us laugh.

You inherited your mom’s beauty, intelligence and sweet tooth, and my short temper, perfectionism and reticence. Because we are so alike, we butt heads more often than I would like, and it takes me remembering that in order to de-escalate these situations.

You are one of the bright lights of our lives, and while some days it seems to have taken forever to get here, mostly time seems to be rushing by at a speed beyond our control. Given all you’ve accomplished in the first five years, we’re excited to see what you will do the next five.

Love,

Mom and Dad

Welcoming Elliot home

Riding his first bike.  At 2 1/2