August 15, 2004

Thirteen.

Mark turned 13 this morning at an ungodly hour. When he goes off to college my plan is to wake him up by phone at that hour. Today I let him sleep.
His plans for today include going to see Alien vs. Predator with his brother and his best friend Mikey and his big /best friend George. Having some wings and weenies of the nuclear variety and then coming home to eat the LOTR cake that it took me 6 different Publixs' to convince to make cuz they no longer 'offer' that cake.
My mom and dad already called to sing to him. I love it when they do that. Just when you think no one remembers your birthday, they call and start singing.
I had already given him his presents of a video game that he wanted and a Green Arrow action figure I found for a steal at the comic book store.

It's hard to believe that he was once this small and even smaller.

I swear he grew another 4 inches this week. He's almost as tall as me now.
He's such a great kid.
He's kind, caring, helpful, compassionate, smart, witty, snarky. I just love him to pieces.
Happy birthday to the kid who laughs with me, helps me, talks with me about anything. Throws fits when he thinks I'm gonna get mad and then it turns out to be something I can fix with a simple phone call to his best friends mom about his birthday plans and Charley trying to ruin it. When you're a kid going through emotional changes, it's all about you and I don't fault him for that. He really thought his birthday was gonna get ruined by the hurricane but even if it had hit us, he would have still had his birthday. We would have just done something different.
He's a wonderful kid.
Happy birthday Mark.
It's been great so far watching you grow up.