We Form Like Voltron

As a result of Little Brother’s first birthday, we are now the proud owners of a toy collection that has doubled (if not tripled) in size. I suppose you could make a case for this being our fault, as we did choose to throw the little man a party and invite assorted loved ones to it. We knew what would happen, right? Nobody to blame here but ourselves.

And in the Doozer we have ourselves an official quality tester of all new toys that enter the house. He’s very dedicated to this position and he takes it very seriously.

So, when one of those gifts turned out to be a miniature basketball hoop with suction cups for the side of the tub (cleverly named “Bath-ketball”), the Doozer decided it was imperative to set it up and give it a whirl. And even though it wasn’t bath night, he declared that there should be a “brothers bath” in order for he and Little Brother to try it out together.

(Yes, this actually happened. I don’t know how we got this kid.)

It was not the first “brother bath” and certainly not the last. So we now have photos of our kids together in a bathtub. We are those people now. I’ve seen these types of pictures before. Many times. Other people have them. I’m actually in some that I’ve seen. We are people who have pictures of our kids together in the bathtub.

We are a family.

As we pass this milestone of Little Brother’s first birthday, it occurs to me that we are really in this thing now. We are not simply people who have kids (I believe a strong argument could be made when it comes to the parents of an only child), we are now a family. We are knee-deep in the hoopla now. This is a family. Between brother baths and group dance parties and cozy couch snuggles, our home has become a hotbed of regular bonding and unity and community.

We are a team. A unit. We’re like Voltron, except when we combine we just kind of drunkenly stagger around and it’s difficult enough for us to keep ourselves upright and generally moving forward, let alone warding off evil forces and saving the world.

These kids, they’re like appendages now. Part of everything I do. Everything I am. They’re in my head, man. When we’re apart, I wonder what they’re doing without me when I’m away from them. I get home and they’re excited to see me. Seriously. They are excited to see me.

How did that happen?

So as this particularly unwieldy version of Voltron lumbers around, spilling food and stretching out neck holes in T-shirts and tripping over stray blocks strewn haphazardly across the living room floor like a minefield, dancing spastically to that crazy Indian pop song from Ghost World and laughing like lunatics set loose from the asylum, we know we will do it all together.

And we’ll have the photos to remember it.