Dear Prudence

57 Weeks

You never know what amazing things will come your way if you relax your expectations. We just watched the Mets in the 2015 World Series. That happened. Greg was thrilled and our family was shrouded in orange and blue for two weeks.

Now, I thoroughly enjoy Halloween. Greg, does not. (Same with karaoke. We're a fun couple with whom to share date-night. Any takers?) Since Ren can't eat candy and we have no business doing so at this juncture in our junk, we decided we wouldn't put Ren in a David Lynch costume just yet. Besides, Ren's 1-year-old check up was the morning of Halloween and that meant shots. Which could easily have meant a crap day. Instead, Ren actually seemed to be energized after his injections this time. The 'ol "I'll give you something to cry about" syndrome? I took it as a sign and dug through a plastic bag filled with hand-me-downs, recalling a monkey suit inside, then spontaneously had all of us hit the center of a neighboring town to trick-or-treat. (AKA showing off our cute baby dressed as an adorable monkey.) You haven't lived until you've entered a local pizza parlor and introduced your baby-primate to a baby-witch, a baby-Captain America, and a baby-Luke Skywalker. None of us had met before and the adults never spoke to one another. We all just collectively shoved our costumed kids together and giggled. "We made these and then put these clothes on them and now we are putting them all together." Alien life-forms would be utterly confused about its meaning.

Today, Greg is out of town so Ren and I had dinner just the two of us. We were almost finished eating, moving on to singing songs, and playing silly games. (AKA doing anything and everything to make Ren laugh.) I stopped and in all seriousness, looked at Ren and told him I liked him.

"Ren. Mommy likes you very much. I love you. You know that? I really think you're fun to be around."

He soaked this in, paused for a good three seconds, and with a completely straight face, raised his hands up over his head like a referee and said, "tree."

The Beatles were wrong. All you need is tree.