"Mom, Stop Kissing My Tattos!"

Turning 5 is a big deal..  I know that in today's fast paced world, kids are in lessons and classes as young as 2--gotta have just the right pre-pre-school activities to launch your little hipster baby into the educational stratosphere!  We didn't really go that route with Teeny Human.  There have been blocks of lessons but, largely, it has been him and us and the close network of family and friends that we have--most of whom don't have children.

So Teeny Human's 5th birthday brought on quite a few observations about what we've done so far...and also a face full of bright, buggy temp tattoos, crowned with two UW Ws above each eye.  Now, instead of Ugga-Muggas and cuddly kisses at night, I have to keep my distance or I will smudge his beautiful artwork. 

5 is new territory indeed.

5 is realizing that Daniel Tiger has given way to Wild Kratts and Hungry Hungry Caterpillar has been replaced with Magic School Bus.  5 is discovering phrases like "Whatever" and "Come on, Man" and "Shut up" quickly followed by a new familiarity with the phrase "I'm sorry, that was disrespectful and I didn't mean to hurt your feelings."  5 skims perilously close to 13 as crying and whining give way to eye rolling and breath huffing when Teeny is unhappy.  5 is still bright and wide eyed at new discoveries but can now talk to us about how they make him feel with more articulacy and emotional intelligence then some of the 45 year olds I deal with daily.  5 has 2 best friends (one real, one a stuffed Huskey ) 5 is old enough to start taking tiny leaps of freedom out of my sight with his human BFF Flash and Flash's ever watchful and responsible big brother, Sirius.  (After all...there's a lot of Jungle in our backyard to explore and a mom just holds you back...) 5 is helping us with making sausage and bacon during Sunday breakfasts and being big enough to run two doors down all by himself (in full sight the whole time, of courses) between our house and Flash's when the 12 hours that they're separated from each other daily is just too long.

5 is also a gut check.  A reminder that we have chosen not to raise Teeny Human like many of our other friends have chosen to raise their children.  There's been no Santa, no Easter Bunny, really, and none of the "parties" of plastic Dinos or Leprachauns and elves who made messes in so many of his friend's kitchens. He knew the story of Hamlet (Lion King) and The Prodigal Son (Veggie Tales) before he EVER knew who Snow White and Cinderella were--and he was only introduced to them because of Once Upon a Time.  So the women HE knows in those roles aren't really much like the ones originally written for kiddy consumption.  There is very little of the traditional "magic" seen in many childhoods.  And, as he starts to make forays out into the real world--we're about to see how that pans out.

CASH and I didn't exactly SHIELD him from the more imagination laced lifestyle.  We simply recognized that not all children are the same because we knew, as kids, that the stories most parents told to fire youthful imaginations weren't real.  And we spent a lot of time trying to figure out what was wrong with us because we didn't buy, hook line and sinker, all of the impossible garbage our peers seemed to accept.

We did not give him Fairytales.  We gave him football. We talk about Archie and Olivia Manning, The Krafts, The Woodens and our Aunts and Uncles.  All of whom love and honor their partners through decades of marriage, kids, fights, and personal changes....and he learns what True Love REALLY is...a choice to commit to a commitment even when it's no longer easy or convenient to do so.

We introduce him to men like Derrick Coleman and Drew Brees so he knows what it means to have faith in a dream--to stay strong and true to the voice inside you that tells you who and what you really are.  To be brave and to persevere even when the whole world is telling you to give up because who you are isn't enough.  We make sure he knows about the 7-9 Division Winning Hawks so he knows to never give ANYTHING less than 100%, even when the situation seems hopeless--because there is ALWAYS hope.

Pigskin parenting isn't easy--we spend just as much time explaining villainous motivations as we do heroic ones. But even then, there are great lessons to be learned--how to overcome hard childhoods, face demons, control vices and fight for redemption after you've done something wrong.  We don't want him to feel like he has to grow up perfect in order to be loved...we want him to know that he can be human and will be loved, anyway, as long as his heart is true and he really does want to be better.

The World After 5 will tell, I suppose, if we have done the right thing.  That's the deal with parenting, whether you do it by a playbook or a storybook...either way, you're putting something you've loved and labored and nurtured over to the best of your ability out in front of the world and you're saying "Please don't break it...but also...it'd be pretty awesome if you liked it, too." 

As I tucked Teeny Human into bed tonight, I found my favorite spot on his temple, just at the hairline and inhaled deeply before giving him a kiss.  Somehow, despite all logic, the sweet, powdery, delicate smell of babyhood still clings to that spot and I needed the reminder that my little boy is still my little boy.

5, after all, changes a guy.  It's a VERY big deal.