Trouble turns ten

[photo by my mom, who remarked, in an e-mail to me: "Now, isn't this just trouble waiting to happen...!"]

This is my youngest nephew, Patrick. Today is his tenth birthday. It's hard to believe he's hitting double digits. I remember exactly what I was wearing the day he was born. I was a freshman in high school and, naturally, obsessed with clothes. Strangely enough for someone obsessed with clothing, I was wearing a long-sleeved, tight-fitting, purple velour shirt.

I can't believe I welcomed this kid into the world wearing purple velour. It was 1997, though. Everyone was wearing purple velour. Right?

Patrick is obsessed with fishing. Last fall we went fishing in the ponds on our family's land and he caught a whopper of a fish.



Since that day, he has called me his "good-luck charm."

Be still, my heart. Such affection does a spinster-aunt-in-training good.

I have a whole host of funny stories involving Patrick. He's a prankster and a ham. But I guess the one story I love above all is this one, from 2004:

... Casey is into making beaded bracelets with lettered beads that spell out words. Well, Patrick, while Casey was off doing something else, got into the beads and made my mom a bracelet in a hurry, before Casey caught him. He brought it to her and said, "I couldn't spell 'Grammy' so I wrote 'I love Tim' instead," and ran off. Heh.

The kid is a comedian.

Happy birthday, Patty.