Today summer has settled in.  I'm caught up with my work and the week that was supposed to be busy has fizzled.  So, now I have a bit of breathing room and time to clean house (a never-ending task which if left unattended produces most undesirable results).  Yesterday I took Charlie and his friend George to the library where they restocked their supply of reading material. I brought home "West of Jesus" by surfer/writer Steven Kotler (What could be a better sign of summer than reading about the beach?) who, after overcoming a lengthy illness, sets out on a spiritual quest...  “Jim said ‘Did you know that in the last census seventy-thousand people listed their religion as Jedi..?’”

The library book Charlie is most excited about is a guide to creating perfect hoaxes. Today, he and George got to work, with laser-like focus, on fashioning a pair of Bigfoot feet to be worn while walking over soft dirt, leaving behind Bigfoot tracks that will surely (they hope) confound the discoverer.  And as if that's not enough, their next project was the creation of a seamonster that will form the basis of their next hoax.  (Yes, you guessed it, their own version of Nessie.)

My family, as a good male friend once put it, is estrogen heavy.  I have three sisters (and one brother who had as little to do with us girls as possible growing up).  My sisters have four daughters between them.  Then Charlie came along; the first new male addition to the family in 45 years and I find myself delighting in his boyish peculiarities. The world is a mysterious place and Charlie is determined to look for the answer to as many of those mysteries as he can.

One of these mysteries in Charlie’s world is cryptids. What are cryptids?  Nessie and Bigfoot are cryptids, basically, creatures that are rumored to exist but whose existence has not been proved.  Charlie has been immersed for some time now in the practice of drawing various cryptids and describing their pertinent characteristics.  At his age, I was more interested in cataloguing and tracking the movements of Sean Cassidy and Leif Garrett.  I watch Charlie at his important work with fascination that he finds this topic so intriguing.  While he doesn't plan to become a “crypozoologist” when he grows up, he plans to practice it avocationally (which should make his wife very happy, I'm sure).

I've always thought that boys were different and I was totally unprepared to raise one of my own.  (Which is untrue because, as everyone knows, no previous experience is required when it comes to childrearing.)  What I've found is that while it's good to have Husband around to answer those mysterious boy questions (and to wrestle -- always wrestling), the best thing about having a boy is just enjoying the ride.

--