My baby is on the right planting a kiss on my granddaughter Hannah.

John is 23 today. My mother, not long after we announced I was pregnant, informed me I’d have a boy who’d look like Erin (his sister). I did, and he does. He’s named after my father, and I only wish that my dad could still be here to appreciate how much his grandson shares his personality.  I’m certain, though, that he and my mom have been watching him, from their heavenly vantage point, as he’s grown.

Like his older brother, he arrived nine days after his due date. He weighed 9 pounds, 15 ounces. If he’d been my first, he might have been an only child…

When I brought John home, Michael was eight, Erin was five, and the twins were two. I laugh when I hear young moms obsess over their babies’ feeding and sleeping schedules. John, my father used to say, should have been born with velcro on his back because “you’re taking the poor baby in and out the car so much, it’s be a lot easier than that car seat you keep strapping him into.”  John’s “schedule” the first years of his life was determined by his siblings school schedules and extracurriculars, which meant he slept and ate in the car.

We’d be tearing up and down the roads, picking up one kid, dropping off another, and I’d look in my rear view mirror, call his name, and he’d delight me with a wide, shiny-eyed smile. As the youngest of five, he’s my most accommodating child–sometimes to a fault–placing his needs behind those of his siblings. Though he’d probably not want me to advertise this, he’s also my most sensitive child, but that makes him all the more like my father. Like my father, he loves children. He’s smitten with his nieces, and they adore him.

He’s fiercely independent, and he manages to pull himself through his challenges without whining and without blaming. John will graduate from L.S.U. this fall. I’m proud of everything he’s done to make that happen.

Happy Birthday, John!