Getting to Know You

My eldest son, Thorn, is a whirlwind of personality. His imagination is vast. One moment he is driving his train-shaped bed on a journey to some personal dream space, the next he is lining up his cars in neat little rows, all the while chatting amiably with them, or with some invisible personage. This evening he dashed about, head cocked to one side, and engaged yet another invisible personage (this time far way) on an imaginary mobile call. Each day he surprises me with some clever new game or adorable delight. What is he thinking, I wonder, when he hunches over and swings his arms low? Is he a monkey? An old man? Me, after not enough sleep? I cannot always tell what he is doing, and certainly do not always know what he is saying. He is a cipher. I know him, and yet I don't. He is continuously reshaped. What he was yesterday, he will not be tomorrow. Like the proverbial river, I am faced with a new Thorn each time I see him. I love it. Watching as he grows, and stretches his mind to wrap it around some new concept, as words, both comprehensible and not, tumble from his toddler lips, is a tremendous joy. He makes me smile. He makes me laugh. I wonder what he'll be tomorrow, what journey we'll go on, and where our day will end. Oh, fatherhood, I do love you.