How to tell your third kid from your first

 

Note the appropriate response here is: "When did THAT happen?" because let's be honest, life is moving so fast, there's no other question to ask.

When Nature Imitates Life

Every time I look out my dining room window and see these growing on the hill, I think, This is my household. My three sons.    

 

I can almost hear them bickering: Bruh, you're standing too close to me. Yo, let me squeeze in. Ouch! You're on my foot. You just elbowed my groin. Stand still. Why can't you ever just listen? Dude! Let me stand in between you guys. Guys!

 Etc. Etc. 

And for the love of all that's holy, one more etc.

They're tall and lanky, these guys on the hill. And now so are the guys inside my house. 

One son — Junior — is 16 years old and six feet tall; one — Everett — is 12, almost as tall as I am, and stuck in tweenager awkwardness; and one — Cam — is eight years old, trying desperately not to get left behind.

Junior was seven months old when I started this blog; in a few short weeks he'll round the corner towards his driver's license. I don't know where the years have gone but at the same time, I feel like we've lived 100 lifetimes since. 

Five years ago, when we first moved into our new home near New Haven and I first saw the plants in our yard, I thought we had accidentally planted corn. Really thin, oddly kerneled corn. I'd never seen them in Mulletville; then again, we only had 0.25 acres of crabgrass. 

 

I found out the strange, stalky weeds are actually common mullein. 

That summer, and every summer since, I hacked them down but this year I let them proliferate, and I kind of love them. The weed is delicate, with its rosette wreath of leaves, but strangely phallic. It's a little schizophrenic-looking, as if the top and bottom of the plant can't agree on who it wants to be.

It's said that mullein can be used to treat respiratory issues, to reduce inflammation, and in salves for burns or rashes. Mullein's velvety leaves were once used as toilet paper, hence its nickname, Cowboy Toilet Paper.

Interestingly, mullein spreads but isn't aggressively invasive. Like, Hey, if you let me grow here, I won't change your landscape, make extra work for you, or take over your home.

They're tall and lanky, these guys on the hill. And now, the more I think about it, so very unlike the guys inside my house.

So very, very unlike.