Cousins

Cousins...

What an awesome thing.  Built in playmates that you don't have to share your parents attention with!!  It's like the uber sibling!

I was fortunate enough to have grown up with my cousin (Scottie) who was also my best friend.  We were inseparable.  And when the miles separated us, we still connected whether through visits, email or phone calls.  Eventually Scott came out east to go to school and that put us within driving distance again.  In our 28 years we have been through a lot.  Besides my brother, no one has known me longer (referring only to those in our generation of course). Our relationship has grown and transformed over the years, adjusting to the different stages of our lives.  Now...married with two kids... and what seems like eons away from our childhood, I am still blessed to see him almost weekly.  We both ended up back in Tucson...both married to spouses with whom the other has become friends...and both travel in the same circle of friends.

I have to say it is pretty amazing.

It is an understatement to say he did, does and always will hold a very special place in my heart.

A friendship like this is what I wish for my sons and their cousins, Zane and Thea.  Besides my selfish desire to see my niece and nephew FAR more than I do, I want the kids to be close or at least develop a relationship/friendship they can count on for the rest of their lives.  They don't have to be best friends (but I hope they are!), but I guarantee the memories they create as kids will hold a special place in their hearts for each other forever.

This hit home this past week when Zane and Ayden had their first telephone conversation.  They chatted and chatted...it was down right hilarious.  Ayden walked all around the house talking away like a real phone pro.  He then proceeded to take the phone with him to the potty. (great manners...I swear I have no idea where he got that from!!)  What you don't get to hear on the video - because I was too dumbfounded by the whole thing and laughing to pull myself together to video it (and notice it is sideways!!) - is that Ayden is telling Zane how they are going to go on a trip together and see whales (Shamu) and how Uncle Michael and Aunt Dasha and Thea and Mommy and Dadddy and Mimi are all going too!  It was just adorable!

I apologize for the TMI in this video, but hey....he's only 2!



And so I hope every day that these four miracles who have come into this family and made our lives forever bright will also share common memories of their wonderful childhood together.  They have only played together a handful of times and yet these kids (Zane and Ayden at least for now),  are drawn to each other.  They love each other in their unquestioning, wholehearted, boundless way.

While I am probably the mushy mom of two - guilty as charged -  (certainly not the stoic soldier like Scott), watching these kids makes me feel soooooo warm and fuzzy inside because it makes me think of my Scottie; my playmate; my best friend; my confidant; my cousin.