Thursday, September 25, 2014

Crush

My little boy is experiencing his first real crush and from a mother's perspective it is both cute and mildly disturbing. I discovered this quite by accident but once I did all of the pieces about his new behavior became quite clear. He's loved school for some time now but this year he comes bouncing out of bed each morning eager to get to school. Last year getting him dressed each morning was a struggle with my wanting to dress him in Gap and his preferring to look like a a mixture of Eminem and southern redneck. This year he has adopted a habit (which I love) of letting me pick out his well coordinated outfits each morning. On the mornings he does pick out his own clothes he has taken to asking me if his shirt matches his pants then contemplating which shoes he should wear instead of defaulting to his dreaded Spider Man sneakers that light up. Then there is the insistence that he look in the car mirror each morning to make sure he doesn't have any stray smears of food on his face. Add in his new insistence that we park in a certain parking lot each morning during school drop off and I should have suspected that something was up but in hindsight all of these are cues that I had completely missed.

Call me clueless but I first suspected something was up when he would eagerly run up to a cute little blond girl each morning and excitedly chatter away with her as we walked up the hill. He would also talk excitedly to her mother, starting each sentence with the phrase "excuse me" before narrating a story or detail about what he had done since he last saw them. Both mother and daughter always give Sidney their full attention which he loves. Over the course of the past week I noticed that would be craning his neck on our walk up the hill from the parking lot to the school then jumping with joy when he spotted the little girl and her mom. Daily recaps always include details about what he did with this girl during the day along (they drew an American flag together) but also have the qualifier that sometimes boys and girls don't play together at school. Last Thursday after school he sadly told me that the little girl hadn't been there but on Friday he practically ran into traffic in excitement when he spotted them. They were walking ahead of us but returned his affection by turning around and smiling several times before making her mother stop so we could catch up with them. And then there was last weekend's Oktoberfest celebration. He spotted them across the tent and jumped out of his seat wanting to go say hello to them. (And this was after he had flat out refused to go greet other classmates of his). Glenn brought him over and watched as our son said hello to the object of his affection.

Watching this from a mother's standpoint is strange. First, my little boy is just shy of five so I had assumed I have years before I would have to witness his flirtatious behavior. Five! (That just seems so young but Glenn has informed me that he kissed his first girl around this age). This is my little boy who still sleeps with and carries around his "baba" (blanket) when he is at home. But he is the same boy who is proudly declaring that he is a big boy and can do things for himself now. And apparently liking a girl (or gurl as he says) is one of those things. I'm simultaneously proud and a bit unnerved. I'm also a bit scared and sad. This is partially because I am just not ready for this but also because we are all military families and I happen to know she will be moving soon. I don't want to have to witness my son's heartbreak when the object of his affection leaves the country for another destination. Or when she breaks his heart by rejecting his little boy's advances. But maybe she won't, or he won't. I don't know.....what I do know is that I am just not ready for this. But then again, will I ever be?

No comments:

Post a Comment