Birthday Boogers

I woke up this morning with my son beneath the covers next to me. His eyes were open as if he’d been waiting for me to wake up. I had  a yoga class to teach so I closed my eyes, hoping in my fantaasy world that he would go back to sleep. He leaned over, smiling, and said, “Happy birthday,” then closed his eyes and pretended to go back to sleep.

I rolled out of bed, my body achy from a cold I’ve been fighting off – that and too many late nights/early mornings this week tteaching and travelling. M-ito came out a few minutes later. “Dad-dito,” he said. “I want you to know I didn’t put any boogers on you last night. It’s your birthday so I put them on me instead.”

“Thank you,” I said. “That’s a very thoughtful gift.”

“Today,” he continued, “we’re going to do all things you like to do. So if you don’t want to watch Pokemon tonight (a bit of an evening ritual we’ve been following these days) you don’t have to. We’ll watch what you want to watch.”

“Okay,” I said.

“But… if you want to watch Pokemon, the movie we still haven’t seen, you know, that’s all right with me too.”

“Good.”

Then he hugged me as we looked at each other in the bathroom mirror. It wasn’t so long ago he couldn’t see himself without standing on the step-stool. Now he almost fits under my arm – almost. He’s a beautiful combination of Mom-ita and me.

Then we went out to the living, me to my yoga practice and preparation for the class I had to teach in an hour, and him to watch some TV, Phineas and Ferb to be exact. Usually I don’t let him watch TV while I do my practice. But it’s my birthday, so I figured if he could put the boogers on his own arm instead of mine, I could let him watch a show while I did my practice.

In-school Bardo

Bardo – Buddhist term – an intermediate state. The term usually refers to the term between death and rebirth. The Wisdon of No Escape, Pema Chodron.

My son is in bardo – the place between comfort in his old school and his end destination of fitting in at his new one. I’ve heard a little through M-ito but mostly late at night or via phone calls while I was away in New Orleans and then Lansing Michigan – working. But the picture is pretty clear to me. My son is in bardo. It’s a hard place to be, but it’s a place of growth. My son doesn’t want to hear that, though. He just wants to be out of bardo and on the shore of fitting in.

M-ito made his first friend during his first week at school. He called them aquaintences up until then. He named his first friend, Jacito, a boy from the other 2nd grade class. They played tag together with some other boys. Tag is one of M-ito’s favorite games. He laughs when he plays and his laughter is a sound that makes you and anyone around you smile. I thought, from my hotel room, listening to Mom-ita tell me of his adventures, that things seemed to be moving along. The process of forming with a new group had begun. I had expected it to be rocky but so far so good.

After he made his first friend, he told Mom-ita that he waited for the other class to come out for recess the next day. He waited by the door. I have this picture of him waiting for the other class to come out. “Will they come out today?” he told me later  he wondered. “Are they out sick?” Two days a week the two classes did not have recess together. He learned this while waiting for them to come out. Then on Friday, M-ito’s friend changed the game of tag to bullfight tag. A different game – out of my son’s comfort zone. He was still in bardo. He didn’t want to play. I know some things about my son and one thing is he likes to have mastery over games he plays. He doesn’t like games that he thinks he’s not good at – especially games that he’ll look bad playing. Embarrasment is a big factor even for 7-year olds. I understand this.

He sat on the fence watching the kids for two days. Mom-ita didn’t know what to do but she waited it out. She bounced her ideas off of me but she knew in her heart what was right for her son. I listened and agreed with her. M-ito’s teacher came to Mom-ita at the end of the second day and said, “I’ve been watching and waiting too. Other kids have asked him to play games bu he’s saying no. I’m not going to let it go on much longer.” The next day she asked M-ito to sit by her so he wasn’t by himself again. Some kids asked him to play bull fight tag then and he said yes. This time he got the rules down and played better. Perhaps the choice of sitting next to the teacher, whom he seems to like, or playing tag pushed him to play. In any case it worked.

He’s played other types of tag since then and played soccer yesterday. He played goalie. He says it’s easy and he likes it – with a shrug. No one else wants to play goalie so he steps up. He found a place from which to participate. I give him a lot of credit. Bardo is not an easy place to be. It’s so much easier to stay in your comfort zone, so much harder to step off into a strange land.

As a father I have found the whole process to have a hint of the unreal about it. I’m experiencing much of it second hand – through Mom-ita. M-ito is close to her because she drives him in and picks him up. She is his lifeline to see at the end of the day. I am the guy he sees most evenings at 6pm – regular time, usually coming home while he’s in the middle of his homework. He doens’t ask me for help, that is Mom-ita’s domain. Even trying to make one day a week driving in with the two of them – it’s still hard to stay part of things. Drop-off happens so quick. Mostly, like so many Dad-ditos these days, I try to catch up on the weekend. You see, I’m in my own bardo too. I’m adjusting to change and allowing this new aspect of our relationship to grow also. It sounds good on paper but it sure is hard to do.

First Day of School

Who’s more scared? Parents or kids? At a new school for the third time in my child’s life I think it might be a tie. Mom-ita and I drove M-ito to his first day of school last week and I took two days off to be there for the whole first day and for the one hour intro to school the day before. The commute was fine, not to much traffic, but lots of nervousness in the back seat and the front.

Mom-ita cried and I found tears coming to my eyes also as we gave him a hug before he was lead off to his classroom. M-ito’s first day was well planned out by the school he’s going to. They welcomed new students by name, with a handshake and gift from an upper classperson, in a morning assembly that all parents were invited to. We ate lunch with our kids then took off and did some food shopping while we waited. It was something to do. It was a day of waiting and of reflecting and shopping was a nice concrete something to do. We had about four hours to wait – on and off during – that first day in between meeting his teacher, seeing his classroom, being told by school administrative staff and the headmaster that “everything will be okay,” over and over again. Sure – easy for them to say.

I was surprised at how strongly I felt about sending him to school. This was truly the summer of transition from one school to another, from one set of friends to another, and for us as parents from one set of parents whose kids M-ito knows, to another. We are in the midst of meeting all these new parents, just as M-ito is in the midst of meeting all these new kids. Each of us is having to manage new relationships like crazy. I have to put my hand and my “self” out a lot. I have to say hello and introduce myself, try to remember which kids are which and which go with which parents. Mom-ita has been doing it all summer and I’m still catching up. Now I’m putting faces to names I’ve heard and trying assign kids to them.

What has caught me a little more by surprise than these difficulties is how watching my son go to school has reminded me of my own going to school when I was his age. It has brought up deep feelings of loss and sadness for what was. I changed schools and homes when I was going into fourth grade, M-ito is changing schools in 2nd. I remember leaving people behind and meeting new kids, best friends-to-be, none of which I’m still in touch with or becuase they have died long ago. I remember getting a new father and house to live in. I can feel this viscerally, in the tingling in my fingers as I type away. What a mix. Seeing this kind of history spread out in front of my son overwhelms me. But it’s my past not his.

At lunch after the assembly my son came over to me, so that Mom-ita wouldn’t be able to hear, and said, “I want to go home.”

I looked at him with my heart breaking. “Can you last for a few more hours?” I asked him, looking deeply into those brown eyes of his.

“How many hours is that?” he asked.

“Two.”

Then he nodded and hugged me. I didn’t tell Mom-ita about this until later.

When we came back to pick him up at three o’clock he was happy and seemed fine. He’d had science last period and he loves science and so his whole experience was framed by what he did there. His teacher had told them to pick a kind of scientist they would like to be – M-ito said paleontologist, of course – and to draw a picture of one on the front cover of their science notebook.

From the back seat of the car M-ito said, “I tried to be small in the class, but they wouldn’t let me be.” Mom-ita smiled while I drove. In his last school M-ito could “be small” and not noticed – not get attention – if he was quiet and followed the rules. He could “dissapear” if he wanted to – which I think he did a lot. In this school they introduced the kids to each other, asked them to play games with each other in recess (stopping cliques from arising – or at least attempting to) and seemed to try and notice what kids were doing and not doing. Small classes, good teachers. So far so good. But it meant that M-ito had to be more social than he was used to being. He is a shy kid who takes time to warm up. He must have been exhausted from all that kind of work. I know I was. I said hello and shook many hands in the parent meetings, at the coffee shop where I saw more of the same parents hanging out – just like us – and when we picked M-ito up. I had to force myself. I learned new names and forget them all within a matter of moments. Still, it’s part of the job of a parent. At 47 I have to tell you it’s not easy to go out and make new friends. I don’t necessarily want to put in that kind of effort but it comes with the territory. I guess I like to “be small” too.

After not talking about school for a few hours – even though we pestered M-ito left and right about what he did, at dinner time he finally gave us the whole run-down.

His second day I went to work with a knot in my stomach.

It’s his third day today, this beautiful Monday morning, and his first whole week of school. I’m doing my deep breathing exercises, trying to stay present, and not slip into the past. Mom-ita and M-ito left 45 minutes ago. I’m heading out too. I find I have to remind myself, this is his school experience, not mine. And this is my parenting experience, not his. The idea, I think, is to try to keep things that way. The challenge is in making it so.

Shower Power

It’s evening and M-ito has to take a shower. I still shepherd him into the bathroom and wash his hair – though many of M-ito’s friends already wash themselves he’s only partially reached that goal. He mostly laughs while he washes himself, tickling himself and playing all the while oblivious to the T-word, time. His technique for washing his feet is to put the washcloth on the floor, step on the washcloth and move around on it, sometimes dancing the Mexican Hat Dance. It’s ingenious in its own way.

But I digress.

Getting him to take a shower is still a fight. From the moment we tell him he has to take one – at this point only once every three days or twice a week – to the attempt to get him in the bathtub. Once he’s in these days it goes pretty smoothly. I sit back and watch while he showers until it’s hair time, trying not to fall asleep.

But getting him to take his clothes off and actually step into the shower, very similar to the longest ten steps to the front door, is almost impossible. And at 6pm after a long day at work and the commute home, it’s even harder for me. I have little patience left in me and if I’m not in touch with it I’m in big trouble because a yelling match will ensue followed by guaranteed tears. I can tell I’m on empty too. I can feel the gas tank meter knocking on the E and the light on. I can feel the feelings of frustration rise up into my chest and throat from my belly. But sometimes I just can’t do anything about it. It works that way with me.

Two feet from the bathtub… yet so far.

Five minutes of telling me stories about Pokemon and he has finally taken his shirt off.

Another five minutes of telling me about Humphrey the Hamster and his pants go wizzing by over my head while I duck.

Wondering about the nature of Phineas and Ferb and his favorite episode where Doofenshmirtz and Perry the Platipus fence with bratwurst and hotdog ends with his underwear off.

I’m not kidding you. It really goes on this long. The socks, one at a time.

Then he plays with his penis, wondering why it looks sometimes like a tree and sometimes like a rocket, and sometimes just sits there staring back at him, pondering the possibilities. “Dad-dito, what does it think about?”

If I last this long I’m usually steaming by now. If I can’t hold it in anymore I usually yell, “GET IN THE TUB!”

Friday last week this comment made M-ito say, “Why are you so angry at me? You just got home and you’re already yelling. Why?”

My son knows how to get to me. I lowered my head, shook it from side to side and said, “I don’t know.” Other days I add, “I’m  sorry. I’m tired.” Or, “Work with me here, will you?”

What to remember?

1. My son likes his time with me and when he talks he’s enjoying telling me about what’s important to him. So, even if it seems unimportant to me, I need to remember it’s important to him. His world is Pokemon and Phineas and Ferb. Mine is yoga, HIV/AIDS, and Drug Treatment. One is not more important than the other.
2. I need to warn him – which sometimes I do – that I’m losing my patience and that I’m tired so he needs to move it a little. This helps me to remain calmer a little longer – staves off the yelling for another minute or two. Letting him know it’s me, not him is a good thing.
3. Sometimes you just have to let things take a long time. I find I’m always trying to make my son go faster. Why? Whose deadline is it? How important is that we’re on time? What does it mean to be on time? Can we instead be in time? What are we late for? Can it take twenty minutes longer? I have to remind myself to take my time – allow him to take his.
4. And last but not least, it reminds me that it’s the simple, mundane things that make up being a Dad-dito, not the big things, which come up rarely. Why? Because the small things come up every day. Or in the case of the shower, at least two times a week.

Walk the Walk

Maybe you’ve seen this too. A parent, usually a father walking in front of his child sometimes a few feet, sometimes ten feet or more, and the child is walking behind. The man doesn’t look back to check on the child (I’ve seen it with boys and girls). The child rushes to catch up then falls behind because his legs are too short and he can’t keep up.

Yesterday I saw it twice. Once on a main street and once on a side street. On the main street it was a small boy, maybe five, who was huffing and puffing, running then walking, then running then walking, trying to catch his father. The father didn’t look down or back even once. Not even to yell, “Come on!” He just walked, crossed streets, shouldered his way through crowds, and the child tagged along behind. I guess he had things on his mind.

The second one I saw was an older girl, maybe 8, in school dress running to catch up to her father then stopping for a moment to look at flowers then running to catch up and walk beside him. He also did not look down or check on her. He was lost in his own world and seemed to have forgotten her. The look on her face was heartbreaking as she looked up at him when she was next to him, tried to get his attention, then gave up.

I walk too fast for my son sometimes but I have to turn and stop when he’s out of my peripheral vision and say, “Come on, keep up, we’re late. Gotta keep going. Hurry!” I’ve got a collection of sayings I use to try and spur him forward. Sometimes I just say, “Let’s race!” And it never ceases to amaze me how fast he can run when he wants to. But usually I try and tell myself to slow down. Even if he’s walking one step away from slow motion. Stay at his pace, I tell myself. It’ll be better for both of us – even if I’m late to a meeting or appointment. Even if I’m late. I never let him out of my sight, I mean never. Okay, maybe four or five times in my life with M-ito I have lost track of him either at the park or once in Disney Land (I hate those crowds). At the park kids or parents blocked my view and I had to rush over to find M-ito because he moved over ten feet in those few moments to play with some other kids. Four or five times and each one practically gave me a heart attack. Walking ahead of my son and not even looking at him? Not knowing where he is? I can see being so angry at him that I’d want to do that – say, “If you don’t hurry up I’m going to leave you  here.” Then try to walk ten steps to see if he follows. But I could never go any further. I don’t want to. The whole time I’d ask myself, “What are you doing? This is s-t-o-o-p-i-d.” I’d just be doing it as another attempt to get him to move – a little, perhaps faster, perhaps just out the door. Oh the games we play with our children.

But, to walk and not look back. To not even seem to care?

Yoga (M-ito) Sutra

I was up at 5:50 am, late for me. The darkness was fuller with daylight savings pushing the sun farther away from the early morning hours. M-ito awoke at 6:30 when I went in to wake Mom-ita. We had a date day planned and had some preparation for our morning/afternoon together. M-ito’s eyes were open and he rolled out of bed. I walked him to the bathroom and, after he’d peed, into the dark living room. 

“I’m half way through my yoga,” I said quietly. “You want to lie on the couch and wait?”

“No,” he said. “Can I do yoga with you?”

It has been a while since we’ve done any yoga together. I’ve been out of his school because of my work load since November and feeling guilty about not teaching yoga to his class and the kindergardeners. This all flashed through my mind as he looked up at me. 

I smiled. “Sure.” I said. I put a blanket down for him, next to mine. 

“This is the perfect size for me,” he said.

“It is,” I echoed.

We did pidgeon or eka pada rajakapotasana.

“I can do this, Dad-dito,” he said.

We did navasana or boat pose.

“That’s hard to do, Dad-dito,” he said shaking while he balanced on his sits bones. Then we did tabletop together and he laughed. “I can balance on my knees,” he said, coming down to earth and rolling onto his knees. “Watch this!”

“That’s hard to do, M-ito,” I said and didn’t even try to put that kind of pressure on my old workhorses.

“Is this a yoga pose?” he asked.

“It is now,” I said.

“I made up a new yoga pose!” he said.

“Indeed you did.”

We followed with janu-sirsasana, setu-banda sarvangasana, a full wheel, and savasana. Then we rolled onto our sides together and sat up. 

“I’m doing my Om Namos,” I said. 

“Can I do them with you?”

“Sure.”

“Can we set up the blankets facing each other?” he asked. I said yes and set up our blankets next to each other so we could find cross-legged pose with our knees almost touching. I showed him half-lotus and he found it easily. “Can I use your beads?” he asked.

I hesitated a moment. My mala has my energy in it. Then I thought of the beauty of his fingers working through each of the worn beads and nodded. “Sure,” I said. “I’ll use yours.” His is a wrist mala. “Just remember I have to go around three times and you only go around once.”

M-ito nodded. “I want to do your new one – what is it again?”

“Om tare, tutare, ture, sarva shanteem kuru swaha.”

“Um… maybe I’ll just do my old one.”

“Okay,” I said. “Ho sum, sum ho, it is.”

M-ito finished five beads before I did.

“Namaste,” we said together and bowed to each other.

Then it was time to get ready for school.

Om nama shivaya.

Make-and-Mend Sunday

“What do I do when I’m not doing legos?” M-ito asks. He’s lying in bed, trying to keep his eyes open and failing, though giving it his all. Mom-ita is on one side and I’m on the other. We’re talking about our make-and-mend day – our Sunday. With snow outside (and me disappointed not to go sledding) we stayed in all day. M-ito had a bit of a cold so we decided to play it safe and do no-thing. This entailed the following some-things (not particularly in any order):

• Working on the “Death Star” lego model that his pop-pop bought him as the big christmas gift of the year. This is an over 3,000 piece model that is taking up a whole corner of our living room as he rummages through the pieces (and constantly asks us to help him find a piece) and the 200 page instruction manual. We figure it ought to take him a good two weeks to finish.
• Watching Animal Planet.
• Wrestling and jumping on the bed.
• Me reading him four chapters of Far-Flung Adventures: of Fergus Crane by Stewart and Riddell (a great read-to and read-along with book for a 6-year old with spectacular pen and ink drawings on most pages).
• Mom-ita reading him Max’s Words by Banks and Kulikov (a terrific picture book about the power of words and story telling).
• Watching the gerbils as I cleaned their cages (the two mommies fought so they’re now in two separate tanks of two mother-daughter pairs) and as they watched him play with his Star Wars lego characters.
• Watching the second half of Star Wars I: The Phantom Menace (we’d watched the first part earlier in the week).
• Watching the Secrets of the Furious Five (a sequel to Kung Fu Panda that we got as a boxed set over the holidays) two times along with learning how to draw Po, checking our Chinese new years and zodiac animals (M-ito is a horse, Mom-ita a tiger and yours truly… an Ox), watching different styles of kung fu based on the animals in the movie – moves modeled by kids, and finally each of us taking a quiz that determined which style of kung fu was most suited to us (M-ito the serpent, Mom-ita and me the crane). The movie, by the way was short at 45 minutes but really excellent and quite a good surprise. It is Po telling five stories, one about each of the furious five and a lesson each learned in order to become a master (courage, patience, etc…). 
• Taking a shower and had a huge meltdown (M-ito, not me this time).
• Eating breakfast and linner (lunch and dinner combined).
• Playing with his Didj (that’s for another column – ugh).

“What do I do when I’m not doing legos?” he asks again, cocking his head to the side, one eye closing. Mom-ita and I list what we remember of the day.

“Oh yeah,” he says and lays his head down on his pillow, Puffy the Puffin, his new favorite stuffed animal, close by his side.

Taoist Theory

If I accept the concept of life then I have to accept the concept of death – they go hand in hand, one with the other, one after the other. I think of these things when I notice my son has grown. Change is the constant fluctuation of Yin and Yang, one into the other, back and forth, the balance between the two never static, but always moving.

M-ito said this moring, “I took a shower by myself last night!” He was lying on the bed, his clothes scattered around him, his PJs still on. I sat next to him trying to get him to hurry and get dressed.

“You did,” I replied.

“You didn’t have to take a double shower with me.” He smiled, proud of himself.

I smiled back, proud also. I’d talked him through the shower from outside the stall, reminding him to wash under his arms and behind his ears, laughing with him as he tickled himself.

“Some day,” he said, still smiling but looking a little past me as if he was seeing some future I wasn’t privy to, “I’ll take a double shower too.”

“With your own son or daughter?”

He nodded. “And when you’re a grandpa you can take a double shower again.”

“That’s the way it goes,” I said, “around and round,” Yin and Yang.

September 11

I was in Tower 2 and still I didn’t remember what day it was today.

I didn’t remember until I got off the subway on 23rd street and saw a friend who started talking about the 9/11 – today, this day. I asked her if she’d been down there on the 11th and she said she’d been down on Fulton. I told her I’d been in Tower 2. Her eyes opened wide and she said, “Wow.”

I started off the day well, with my yoga and meditation, then Mom-ita and M-ito came into the living room – both early, about ten minutes before I was finished. That was all the peace we’d have this morning. Mom-ita walked M-ito into the bathroom to pee – he’s been having moments of being afraid lately, perhaps coinciding with going back to school – entering first grade? Perhaps just afraid of the biting beetles of childhood.

The fighting started with the shower. M-ito resisted and I gave up waiting after ten minutes of standing in the shower and asking him to get in the tub.  There were tears and  harsh words, but I kept my cool, didn’t raise my voice at all. M-it’s voice rang loud and clear. I let it come and go in a wave. M-ito said I’d made fun of him and yelled at him. I had not yelled, but I’d joked about keeping all the hot water to myself to try and nudge him into getting into the tub. It didn’t work and I reminded myself never to try that again. My son doesn’t need excuses to stay out of the shower.

Then he wouldn’t put the nail clipper down when he was supposed to be eating at the breakfast table. By the third time I’d asked him and he’d nodded but not put it down, I’d had it. Then he put the nail clipper down and shot it past me with a flick of his finger. That put me over the edge. I slammed my hand onto the table and said, “That’s enough!” And so we had a second set of tears to cover the morning.

The third set occurred only minutes later. M-ito and I had been eating breakfast silently, him with his back to me, me with my heart breaking. Mom-ita came in to help him put on his socks. She smiled at him and he pushed the socks away onto the floor. We both yelled and tears flowed.

When we got to school, I had to stay in the car while Mom-ita walked M-ito in – we’d parked by a hydrant. I told M-ito I loved him and he barely turned to look at me. I can still feel the hollowness inside my chest from his expression. I know he’ll be over it by this afternoon, the whole morning having passed over like a rain shower, leaving the grass fresh and filled with dew and the sun shining. Then his smile will turn my world bright. But now I hold on to it, too adult and filled with wonderings over what I should have done different to let it all go.

I walked to the subway and down underground. Up at 23rd street, my friend saw me and asked me about 9/11. “Nope,” I said. “I hadn’t thought about it at all.”

“I was on Fulton Street,” she said.

“I was in Tower 2,” I said and watched her face change in reply.

“Wow,” she said.

Nope, I wasn’t thinking of 9/11 at all.

Who’s in Charge?

It’s 6pm. I’m home with M-ito, it’s Saturday evening. Mom-ita is out and won’t be back until after 8pm. M-ito has to eat, take a bath, read books and go to bed – all within an hour. He’s tired from two nights in a row of only 8 hours sleep – once from a late night out and once from being sick. He needs at least 10 hours sleep each night and he’s subsequently … cranky. He asks me if he can watch one of his movies for a little while.

I say no. “We don’t have the time.”

M-ito starts crying and yells at me. “Then I don’t want to talk to you about this ever again.!” He goes into the other room. I’m left staring at his corn dog and orange (I know, I know, but at least the orange isn’t fried.). 

Mom-ita calls and I talk to her for a minute. M-ito comes into the dining area – the tears gone – and asks to speak to her.

I say, “Sure,” and hand him the phone. I wait a moment and watch.

M-ito looks at me and says, “I don’t want you hear this.” Then he goes into the other room with the phone. About a minute later he comes back with the phone and hands it to me.

“What did you tell him?” I ask Mom-ita.

She’s laughing. “I told him if there was time and you said it’s okay, he could watch a little of his show.” The phone is back in its cradle and I’m left with my son sitting down a few feet from me at the table. He starts eating his corn dog with a big smile on his face.

I put my serious face on. “It’s not okay if you ask Mom-ita to do something after I said you can’t do it.” I try not to smile.

“I know,” he says.

“They why did you ask Mom-ita if you could watch your show after I said there wasn’t enough time?”

“Well,” he begins, way too composed, “Mom-ita is in charge of the house… so I thought she might say something different.” 

I laugh. “Yes, she is in charge of the house.”

“I know.”

“I know, you know. But who’s in charge of the house when Mom-ita is not here?”

“You are.”

“And when you don’t do what Mom-ita says you have to do when she’s not home, who gets in trouble?”

M-ito is laughing now. “You.”

“And if I get in trouble, who else gets in trouble?” He’s giggling too much to answer. I point at him. He’s gets to watch some of his TV show and I get a complaint-less bath. He’s in bed by 7:30pm and asleep by 7:45pm. Man, am I glad tomorrow is Sunday. I hope he sleeps late. Okay, what am I saying? I hope he sleeps until 7am. Well, I can hope.