And the Answer Is....

....NOOOOOOOOOO baby! (said in the voice of the Bingo Commissioner.... last summer's runaway smash Friday night hit....America's Bingo Night....anyone? anyone? Bueller? No? OK, I am a loser....)

Bummed. Much moreso than I thought I'd be, for sure. Especially given how scared I was the first couple days. But then I guess I got to thinking, and hoping, and wishing, and wanting.... But honestly, though, it's better off, I know. I have my hands full and then some w/ the toddler-tornado that my son has turned into. I'd love to sit and describe the swaths of destruction and mayhem that are carved in his wake, but I simply couldn't do it justice. Seriously. Even having seen it with my own two eyes, day in and day out, I'll never fully understand how someone so small can make messes that are so big. He is like a tiny wrecking-ball pinball, bouncing and jarring and whooping and pinging and tossing and dumping and screeching and careening and falling over and bouncing up and banging and throwing and squealing and grabbing and dragging and up-ending and knocking and shrieking and smacking and....

"He's a busy one."

"He sure is busy."

"He's very busy, isn't he, Allison?"

"He keeps you moving, doesn't he?"

"He's all boy, isn't he?"

"He is one busy little guy."

Just a smattering of the comments I hear, from friends and strangers alike. The first time somebody commented that he is "busy", it struck me as kind of a funny word to describe a baby. It was actually my mother-in-law who said it; JD was engrossed with the self-appointed task of taking all the blocks from a bucket in the living room, and, one-by-one, transporting them into the kitchen, where he deposited them into an open cabinet. "He's very busy, isn't he, Allison?", she observed.

I heard it several more times over the following weeks, and each time, I was struck that "busy" was the common word of choice.

And then last Friday, in line at the Safeway... JD was oh-so-helpfully taking the Snickers Bars out of their display box and putting them into the box w/ the Skittles. I was just-as-helpfully returning the Snickers as fast as he could displace them. "He sure is busy", the woman in line behind us said. She chuckled, "Like he even know what a Snickers Bar is." We laughed, and that's when the "busy" comment clicked. He really is busy. And therefore, so am I. So all in all, I am at peace knowing that he and I can enjoy our time together, and welcome his little sister to join us later on, when things just aren't so busy.