Niagara Falls

We took the boys to see Niagara Falls. Artist didn't seem to care one way or the other. Superhero was ecstatic, as he had been looking forward to this for a few weeks now, since Daddy showed him pictures online. But Fighter--my Fighter was in heaven. He stared at the falls, with a patented Fighter smile that is a private expression of joy, and is somehow both closed off in such a way that you feel like you're somehow invading his privacy by looking at him and simultaneously so joyful that he almost seems to glow with it, and you have difficulty looking away. He tilted his face to the sky, closed his eyes, and held out his hands to feel the spray. After fifteen minutes or so of just enjoying the sight and the feel of the falls, Fighter seemed to come back from wherever his area of inner peace lives long enough to hold out his wet hand to me and say 'water'. He then leaned forward, put his wet hand against my cheek, and smiled as he gave me a kiss, like he was thanking me for sharing this new, wonderful thing with him. Recently, Fighter frightens me more than my other children, with his firm refusal to talk much, his random and sudden weight loss, and a myriad of other tiny things. But there are also moments when I am convinced he feels things more deeply than the other two, and I struggle to remind myself daily of his sensitivity without labeling him as a 'sensitive' child.

This parenting thing? Not for the weak of heart.

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