Count on me. Count on my love.

Happy Birthday darling Paige!

There are so many things that I want to tell you and wish for you on your very special day, but you're turning a mere three years old, so for now I will write it all here - a place to keep it for a later date.

I remember holding you in the hospital the day you were born. You were wrapped up tight in a blanket, snoozing quietly as family members passed you around and lowered their faces closer to yours, trying to absorb that in our arms was the most beautiful little girl in the world. Your bitty face was made up of a button nose, two perfectly arched eyebrows, fluffy little eyelashes that rested on your rosy cheeks while you slept and a bright pink mouth that couldn't have been painted on more perfectly. Topping it all off was a puffy little mop of jet-black hair that your Auntie Teen and I enjoyed spiking into ladylike mohawks.

You were so adored. Still are.

When you were about 9 months old, Auntie Teen was swinging you above her head making you giggle, grin...and then spit-up all over her beloved Gucci sunglasses and down into her hair. And it may seem odd to you now, but oh, how we loved you for it. Even Auntie Teen...once she stopped laughing and got cleaned up.

A few months after that, your loving little heart started giving us all hugs and kisses. Two pudgy arms would wrap around our necks while your little face would close in on our cheeks with a mouth wide open like a fish resulting in wet Paigey kisses as a memento of your pure sweetness.

You went through an adorable phase for awhile that involved putting you down for a nap with one of those frightful Gloworm dolls, covering you with a blanket and slowly backing out of the darkened room. Then, waiting for just a moment or two for the sound of the "thunk!" letting us all know that you had ceremoniously tossed Gloworm out of bed. You wouldn't get into bed without Gloworm, but he wasn't allowed to stay. The Gloworm Toss Routine entertained me to no end.

Three years after being awestruck by your newborn beauty not one day has gone by where I haven't thought of you, missed you, wished I could hug you...

I love that you wear your sunglasses upside down, love that you're in a stage where you smile for photos by only pulling back the left side of your mouth, love that you nicknamed Charlie "Cha Cha" and my heart melts at the fact that when your mom surprised you with decorating the house for Christmas, you're big heart responded with, "Mom, you're the best." I laugh every time I think of you threatening to throw up in the car because you were too hot in your winter coat and trapped in a car seat. And I fight down a lump in my throat each time I hear your tiny voice from a thousand miles away telling me that you miss me and you love me (even when I know your mom is right beside you feeding you those lines).

Three years old is a major accomplishment! You've passed what adults have cleverly coined, "the terrible twos" - and you weren't terrible at all. You are a dream niece, daughter, granddaughter and cousin. And oh, what a wonderful big sister you are. I wonder if any other big sister has ever loved her two little brothers so much. As someone who is fully addicted to her siblings, I can tell you that every minute you spend with your brothers will be one you won't regret. I hope you always love Charlie and Gavin as much as you do now and as much as I love your mom and Auntie Teen.

Three years feels like it's gone by so fast, yet it's still hard to remember a world without you. Time is only going to go quicker. I'll blink and you'll be graduating from high school... so I'll let you know now every little thing that I hope for you and the life spread out before you...

I hope you try everything. Try all kinds of different foods. Try listening to classical and jazz, along with whatever is on the radio. Try to learn foreign languages. Try to play musical instruments. Try cooking and baking, ice skating and gardening. Try to do as many cartwheels in a row as you can. Try playing soccer and tap dancing. Try every flavor of ice cream.

I wish for you lots of courage. Courage to stand up to bullies and courage to not be a bully. Courage to dance when no one else is. Courage to do whatever it is in life that brings you joy. Courage to barrel right on down those slides even when it's uncertain if you'll be caught at the end... or land on your tush.

I hope you never stop running through sprinklers with your clothes on.

I hope you travel. The world is so big and there is so much to discover. I hope you get to experience the vastness of it. And in all your travels I hope you don't forget to visit me, wherever I may be, on a regular basis. We'll continue to have our slumber parties and make breakfast in the morning before you help make me pretty with makeup...making sure to rub all my lotions and creams on your smooth little cheeks. Because the truth of the matter is...I miss you so much now that it makes my heart hurt...and it's only going to get worse as you continue to grow into the loving, engaging, funny and sweet person that you already are and will surely become.

So, Happy Birthday sweets! Today, to me, you are the most fantastic 3-year-old in the world.

Eskimo kisses,
Auntie Sara

Let the holidays begin with laughter...

Born and raised in Minnesota, I've spent a lot of time since I was 18 being out of the state, enduring comments on how I sounded like an extra from everybody's favorite Minnesota movie, Fargo. For awhile I tried to shake the accent, but lately I've given up the fight. I am what I am. I sound how I sound. And that's just fine.

When I got back to Minnesota last night for a week of family Christmas fun, one of the first things my mother did was show me the Christmas cards sent by relatives. Flipping through I was really only half reading them, half talking to mom about the flight from L.A. and then it caught my eye. I had to reread it...and then I couldn't stop laughing.

My cousin was explaining that she'd be leaving her husband and stepchildren behind in Michigan this year and returning south to her childhood home in South Carolina because, as she says, "I've really got a hankering for my momma."

A. HANKERING. For. Momma!

Whether she meant it to be funny or was dead serious about it, I care not. She used the word hankering and I adore her for it. This girl from Minnesooooota bows down to this relative from the South for being exactly who she is. I've got a hankering to spend time with my family - momma included.

May you all have safe travels back home to your mommas for the holidays.

Under his spell

On the phone with my mom this evening she was recalling all of the funny little things my niece, Paige, said and did while staying with her and Popi Saturday night. To onlookers in Literati, I was the imbecile in the corner with the phone glued to her ear, silently grinning off into space. I love Paige stories and so I was drinking in the details of how she snuck into my mom's office, got on her computer and deleted a file before being discovered. Well done, young one!

Then Popi got on the phone to disclose that Paige and mom had decorated Christmas cookies and that each cookie was now buried under approximately 4 pounds of sprinkles. He says it as though this is an unbelievable atrocity to cookies the world over, but I can hear the smile behind the sarcasm.

Later, when mom tells me that Paige wants to know where Popi (or Papa, to her) is at all times, my smile gets bigger. And I can't help but laugh out loud when she says in disbelief, "She actually said to me, 'Gam, where's Papa?' and I told her I wasn't sure, so she said, 'Well, I better see what he's up to!' She said that Sara! And then she trotted off looking for him in the porch!"


And so it is that another female has fallen victim to my father's charm.

Popi has been the only man living with females since whenever it was that his older brother left their childhood home decades ago. Poor guy has been outnumbered by sisters, a mother, wife, daughters, dolls, bows, New Kids on The Block paraphernalia, curling irons, handbags, shoe collections, tubes of lip gloss and all other things girlie. Even our pet gerbils and fish growing up were always female. He's spent the majority of his life with all of us following him around, shouting out "POPI" whenever we couldn't find him. And lord knows he's seen more than his fair share of dance recitals, synchronized swimming competitions and gymnastics meets.

With me and Teen out of the house for a few years now, I think he got used to the semi-solitude of only having to hide from my mom if he wanted some alone time. But now there is Paige, and it starts all over.

His secret is that he's indifferent. Most of the time he's puttering about the house doing his own thing, not hunting you down. He has a routine of grabbing the paper and going for a morning coffee and on Sundays during nice weather he's golfing with his group of 3 other troublemakers. So, if you want to talk to him or spend time with him, it's up to you to track him down. It's like that act that singles try as an attraction mechanism - hanging back, acting uninterested in order to pique your interest in them - except he means it.

This is a man whom I can't recall having picked up the phone to call me since 1999. He just waits for me to call home demanding that my mother put him on and is then ecstatic to hear my voice - his voice letting me know it's about damn time I called him. Ahh, my complex Popi.

It helps that he's sweet, witty, kind, giving, funny, gentle, sharp, easy to talk to, able to converse with squirrels and birds through a bizarre series of whistles and is on the list of World's Best Huggers. So Paige follows in the footsteps of me, Teen, mom, the pets (they always liked him best) and countless other women in the greater Twin Cities area. It was only a matter of time. He is the flower, we are the bees.

And so to little Paige, a few weeks shy of her third birthday and at this moment sound asleep somewhere in freezing cold Minnesota, I say, "Welcome to the Popi Fan Club." It's no surprise that you've joined; he's a good Papa to you.

However, wee Paige, my own insecurities urge me to remind you that while you are obviously much cuter, I'm his first born, and therefore, clear favorite.

A little something I've been trying to remind him of ever since I was two and Teen came along to share my spotlight.

It's just lucky for you all that I like you enough to share him. Very lucky, indeed.

The noise that silence brings

There is a time for talking, and a time for being quiet...and then there is the time when you really need your voice because it's another horrendous and important week at work...and your body just doesn't care, because you made it work a 13-hour day on Tuesday, and you don't let it sleep enough, and you keep feeding it take-out rather than fresh vegetables...so your body gives up the fight. It breaks down. It lets you get that nasty sore throat and achey muscles. And that rattling cough? Yep, bring that on too. And don't forget the kicker - non-stop fevers and a fond farewell to your voice.

Thanks to years of practice, I'm pretty good at taking care of myself when I'm sick. I can't rub my own shoulders, which I detest, but aside from that, I get by.

This week, however, has knocked me out. By Thursday afternoon I'd sunk into the depths of ill hell where everything hurts...teeth, eyes, shins, hair, every muscle and a throat so swollen I swear it was trying to strangle me.

Staggering around work, home and the doctor's office was like an out of body experience. With pain. Still, I could manage it (barely). But not being able to talk? Oh my monkey, how friggen annoying! I've been lying around ("resting"), which I know is what leads to getting better...but hours of not moving, trapped in my own head and a body screaming cold/flu/fever horrendousness...well, that's a surefire way to go insane.

It's pretty difficult to call for a doctor's appointment when you can't talk, impossible to answer the phone, and trying to tell someone what hurts just becomes a game of charades. We've moved beyond aching shoulders wanting to be squeezed. Never before has being single seemed like such an impediment.

Surprisingly, I've found it's the silly little everyday things that I'm aching to share. The work stuff can be handled with enough grunting and pointing (says a lot for work, when you think about it), but I haven't yet been able to tell Teen about the truck that smashed into the entire row of parked cars outside my apartment, haven't been able to try to talk on the phone with an almost-3-year-old Paige, wasn't able to call Tuck on his moving day and tell him how brave I think his decision to leave New York is, and tomorrow night before going to The Nutcracker, I may just end up being the worst dinner date Teen will ever have. Poor girl.

My mind whirls with the things I cannot say - everything I cannot say. And while I'm happy to be on the mend and no longer confined to my bed, I'm looking forward to no longer being confined to myself, either.

If tomorrow I wake and am able to croak a little more than today, well, then swapping this year's festivus party for 2 tablespoons of NyQuil will have been worth it. After all, it's only weeks before Christmas (also known as my favorite time of year) and I've got a lot of shopping and talking to do.

My city is waiting.


My life is waiting. Time to hop to it.