August5, 2024

I know what’s real and what’s make believe.

Leprechauns are not native to Pfafftown, of course. Our leprechaun came to PFT stowed away in a suitcase when a friend visited Ireland years ago. I guess she saw him in a souvenir shop and thought he was cute, so she brought him state-side for Oh Emily. Sometimes trouble finds trouble, and our Gaelic gangster banded together with some other Emerald Isle transplants and the local NC trolls, and they mercilessly tortured Emily’s much put-upon Brad, the Elf on the Shelf. Now years later, it’s Harry who visits the leprechaun hiding in one of my impatiens planters.

Our white fairy nestles herself deep in the Garden of Dappled Light, quietly surveilling the comings and goings of the birds at the feeder, and encouraging my Mother’s Day gardenia that is still struggling despite my best efforts. She’s shadowed by my Carolina Jessamine trellis, and Harry pats the fairy’s head and steps around her carefully before I pick him up to play with the wind chimes. Our black fairy is a metal silhouette perched high above the fairy garden. Her role is to keep the leprechaun-southie and the northie-gnome HoHo from crossing paths in a rural rumble. Like I said, trouble finds trouble, and HoHo doesn’t need an excuse for a drunken brawl.

HoHo can no longer be trusted to sleep off another all night bender on the front porch of his bird house because he has rolled off the stoop too many times. He is now relegated to nurse his hangover on top of the metal trash can where I keep the bird seed. Harry checks on HoHo almost every time we walk down the driveway, and he has helped Lolli glue HoHo’s broken arm twice. Harry may or may not have had something to do with HoHo’s broken foot. “Aahhhh nooo! HoHo boo boo!”

Harrison Elias Paul McBride, the Harry Boi, H, Harry-rito, Hey Boy is two today. Harry, Lolli has loved you from the first second I knew about you, even before I knew who you were gonna be. I would have loved you sooner if I’d known. Your excitement and energy makes me forget how nice it used to be to sleep in on Mondays and Saturdays because playing with you is always better than catching a few zzzzz’s. Hands down without a doubt.

You love your Papa, and Papa gives you those great squeezes. You know, the hugs-with-sound-effects, and you grumble, grunt, and groan like you’re using all your muscles to squash Papa’s neck in your grip. You’re so strong! How does Papa survive your stranglehold? Lolli does hugs-with-no-expectations. Just a good long strong hug.

We FaceTime almost nightly with Harry Boi. He sees me and asks for Papa. Papa. Papa. Papa. I can’t compete with Papa, and I know Harry loves me, but Papa Papa Papa. He prefers Papa and I’m ok with that. It’s wonderful to see their bond. When we Facetime, I’ve taken to subliminally tricking Harry into seeing me as his hero. When he starts his “Papa Papa Papa,” I tell him “look what Lolli got just for you,” and I turn the camera phone toward Papa. I can’t be Papa, but I can be the Papa gatekeeper. I think if Harry could, he would look at the FaceTime screen and swipe left on Lolli just to see Papa. It’s precious. Paul worries that someday all this Papa worship will disappear. I told him that it will change, but that even if someday Harry steps it down to just a mere adoration instead of the all out love fest of Papa, that will still be pretty awesome.

Loving this grand baby is different than loving my own children. Not better. Not worse. Not more. Not less. But Harry occupies and decorates a completely different room in my heart. My girls were frilly and silly in their own ways, but they also had their rough and tumble moments. I don’t know if there are significantly more snips and snails and puppy dog tails with the Boi than there were with my girls, and I’ve seen the sugar and spice and all things nice in Harry. I believe God’s character of both male and female shines in all of us in different ways and strengths and colors. But I do see God changing me, bettering me, transforming me via Harry in ways I wasn’t ready to be as a mom. I’m hopefully becoming a more perfected image bearer of Christ the longer my Lolli journey continues. “But we all, with uncovered face beholding as in a glass the glory of the Lord, are changed into the same image, from glory to glory, even as by the Spirit of the Lord,” 2Corinthians 3:18.

So what’s real and what’s make believe? Harry’s place in my heart is unshakable and true and never ending. My love for Harry is dynamic and growing and living and breathing like a fluttering cluster of cells in utero that is destined to be a two year old in the garden. Harry is learning and connecting and absorbing everything, good and bad, from his family and friends, and the overflow spills out in his head thrown back, belly out, eyes shut boisterous guffawing laugh. And when it’s too much and he gets bit by the sleepies, he reluctantly recharges with a nap just long enough to build up more energies for the next explosion of fun. That’s real. The leprechaun, the fairies, HoHo, froggie, Bluey, Brad the Elf, Wynken Blynken and Nod, Baby Shark, the bee and dragonfly, the statues and figurines are stories we tell to a very real little boy who is two years old today and loved loved loved beyond his comprehension. Happy birthday Harry!