Three

Michael turned three on the 25th. His sense of time is developing. He knows his birthday's in June, though he may not be sure exactly what June is. He's aware there are babies, little kids, big kids and grownups, knows that he's not a baby, and likes to imagine that he's a big kid.

We encourage this thought -- it helps with toilet training, sharing toys, sleeping independently, and other issues.

Age 3 is fun for child and parents alike. A kid this age not only has language skills, but is using words to formulate propositions about the world. This makes for interesting drive-time conversations on, say, whether cars always drive on the street or sometimes on the grass.

His ideas about the world are sometimes on target, sometimes a little off, and sometimes way off. He believes that leaves grow into trees, that the robin he saw on the porch rail was about to hatch an egg (big belly!), that something bad will happen if he gets pool water in his ear, that cars sometimes park on the grass. Navigation interests him, as it did me when I was a kid; his back-seat perch gives him much opportunity to study the roads and the routes, and he'll detect any change from the normal course.

What does a 3-year-old remember about 1, 2 (or before)? I wonder about this often. I'm sure he's forgotten the trip to Beijing at 11 months, being on an airplane, meeting his Chinese grandpa, his uncle with the camera, the smiling women in the hotel...Or our stroll, just me and him, to see the ancient bells in the dusty little outdoor museum. It was a tranquil, wonderful place in the middle of the urban bustle; the attendant walked around humming a traditional song as I carried Michael around to look at the mysterious objects, which of course he would have liked to reach out and touch...

For a year, starting just after his first birthday, another couple with a baby rented our basement. He remembers that people used to live down there. A little girl and her mom and dad. Their names?

He remembers her dad's name. Antti. And his PT Cruiser.

"He has a funny car. A funny black car".