Child 3

Today is Child 3's birthday and, with no bias, I can honestly say Child 3 is the finest 15-year-old I know. It has spent the last year stretching alarmingly until it seems to be all legs and arms and fiendish blue eyes. It has always had a tremendous sense of humor and a deeply loving heart but it has added a new ambition, a belief in itself, and an acceptance of responsibility that makes me stop and stare sometimes in amazement at its sudden maturity.

This evening we will have chocolate cake with chocolate icing (and probably bits of extra chocolate stuck in here and there where it seems appropriate). We will almost certainly get gyros from the Turkish deli down the street as a particular treat, and Child 3 might even be allowed to break the usual week-day electronics ban. It will unwrap its gifts (rectangular for the most part; one square) and at some point call its grandfather so they may congratulate each other on their excellent taste in birth dates.

And I will watch this tall, funny, intelligent, generous being and wonder again at really, how lucky I am.