The week of Feb 1

Saturday and Sunday

Are snowy

In spite of much persuasion and pleading - R will not come out of the house -The snow is crunchy and not soft and fluffy which is what he likes

He sobs "coputer" "coputer"( computer) and I finally give up.

He tries to get me to take off my jacket and hat.

I do not- as I want to go for a walk .He does not appear to notice my leaving but  I sense he is suspicious that I am leaving the house( without him ) .

The walk is really lovely - I am the only person outside- there are no cars - no people .

Many people use fireplaces here in Tennesee and so the chimneys are puffing smoke gently

I have been watching Emma By Jane Austen on PBS (  my least favorite heroine-because of her snobbery and manipulative ways and the dreadful advice she has been giving to Harriet Smith - who really would not have refused the farmer's proposal had it not been for Emma and her meddling ways  ).

I imagine I am in 1815 ( Emma's time ) .

I look around the snowy neighborhood and imagine it is the cosy village of Highbury. Inside these houses are ladies in gowns gossiping gently over tea and crumpets.

I can see them in my head.

I have a delightful time imagining  the clothes of the lady in the house I am just crossing ( the lady inside is lovely 80 year old woman who paints her nails bright red and talks volubly  about her late husband and his many virtues and her present children and their many flaws- but I find I can easily picture her as a matriarch - a benovelent tyrant in a hat with a long feather )

My reverie is broken when my cellphone trills and I have to time travel 200 years back into the present!

My suspicions ( about R being worried that I had left the house without him ) are well founded .

DH asks me how much longer will I take as R is sitting by the window wailing "Mother Mother"

I resignedly say that I will walk back but DH calls a few minutes later to tell me that the apparently inconsolable and distraught R has given up crying and is squealing with joy over you- tube !!

Such are the hearts of small children.

 And I am free to ramble along the gentle hills of my neighborhood for some more time

 I have to postpone our team meeting( our therapists and ABA implementor meet every couple of months )  becasue really there is no way of driving on this snow

On Sunday afternoon we are finally able to meet and its all icy and gross- but safe.

DH and I make red velvet cupcakes - he is a true artist and while I would just have glopped on the cream cheese icing - he arranges it with graceful swooshes and puts candied pecans on top of them

R's therapists are all thrilled with the progress he is making but they are also starting to realise what I and DH have been thinking about for the past few months- that we have more to worry about than just the apraxia

We remind everybody that just 6 months  ago he had barely any words and we did not know if he would ever talk - and now we are grumbling about sentence comprehension

They cheer up rapidly

R strolls in majestically.

We all demands hugs and so and goes from chair to chair being fawned upon and kissed- and in general being King Tut

Monday

Is a terribly tiring day - I have a 12 hour work day and I come home spent and worn out

I realise that R's pizza is finished - as he is Gluten free - we need to make everything from scratch ( including even the pizza sauce as I have forgotten to put it on the shopping list  - DH can tell from my face that I am in the last-straw-mode and he helps me a lot)

When I open the dishwasher and find that he has already emptied it - my mood changes and I feel loved and happy again

Tuesday

Is cold but sunny - I am able to come home from work on time  and even stop at the eyebrow place so I can return my eyebrows to their state of glory.

Currently I could peel them off and lend them to Burt Reynolds for use as a moustache

My heart sinks when I see that the threading lady in the shop  is the muscular butcher.

I worry too much about hurting her feelings and resign myself to pain

However the very large and very pretty  woman she is currently working on has no such compunctions and tells her what a terrble threader she is -loudly and angrily.

I soothe the hurt feelings of the butcher when its my turn ( though tears spring in my eyes at the pain)  as she works on my eyebrows with her usual brutality.

Still my eyebrows are gorgeous and its all worth it

I and R jump on the trampoline and using the techniques of Wait and Slow we have quite a game going

He tells me to jump high and jump low and is thrilled by my obedience and we spend much time collapsing with squeals and giggle

Wednesday

We play word games in the bath tub.

I try to start a game of rhymes and write ROW LOW

He will have nothing to do with rhymes as his current passion is opposites and so he changes it to HIGH LOW

Thursday

I am itching to clean the playroom and spend some time doing that ( and scold myself severely for not doing floortime - but what is a woman to do?)

I see what he is watching on You tube - which is a song titled - do you know the number of your house?

We  hunt out the number of our house and then play with bubbles in the bath till bed time

It amuses me to see the paraphrenelia that R collects to take  to bed - the number 8, a Little Einstein Book( the adventures of Melody the Music Pet )  and a picture of the Solar System

I know he has a disability

I know this in my head.

But in my heart his uniqueness and his special ways  makes me feel like I have the best-  most fun child in the world blessed with so many gifts