Random Memories on my Older Son's Birthday.

Today, October 24th, 2013, my older son turns forty-seven. He was born at Fort Belvoir Army Hospital in northern Virginia,well over a month past his predicted due date.  He fractured his mother's tailbone on the way out.  We brought him home to a three room, redwood cottage in a cluster of similar cottages on Anzio Lane in Lorton,Virginia.  They had been built to house veterans returning from World War II, I believe.  Over the years most of them had been added to, some replaced with more modern style homes.  Ours was unchanged: unpainted redwood board-and-batten siding, no insulation, a replacement propane furnace stuck through the wall at the far end of the "main room" next to the fireplace to heat the entire house.  The original furnace, non-functional unknown years ago, lay under a huge floor grate in the short hall that led from the big room to the two bedrooms and the bathroom. The cathedral ceilings (uninsulated) made the place pretty close to impossible to heat.  I built a large closet in our bedroom - there were none in the house - and installed a flat, well insulated ceiling in the other bedroom, our baby's room.

So many other memories flash through my mind: of bringing him home, of the curiosity of our two dogs, one of which stood on hind legs to look into the bassinet - not touching it - for a full minute, and so many more.  We lived there the first six months of his life, then sold the house when I shipped to a remote location for a year while wife and boy relocated to a rental house near my family in upstate NY.  When I returned, the 18 month old boy didn't know me, nor I him.  That never really changed.

 We haven't spoken in two and a half years.

Happy Birthday, Jason..