Welcome Home Jordan

Jordan finally arrived home last night.

Tyler and I had just finished pondering whether Jordan had reached the deviled egg smell yet and if his new found family would ever return him.

Not even 20 minutes later, my youngest child suddenly appeared, deposited safely on the front porch at 10 pm, Whataburger Meal in hand.

When your kids are gone for a few days, it's easy to forget the little things you love about them, the things that make them unique.

Unlike last week, when I was out of my mind with stress, and Jordan was looking for the nearest escape (or a friend, any friend, it didn't matter how good of a friend), he arrived last night smiling, grinning, back to being my happy, funny, sarcastic youngest child.

For Jordan, the thing that has always defined him has been his mouth.

And the fact that you never, ever know what will come out of it.

He was my surprise baby, so unplanned. And so different than his older brothers.

You know how babies are when they are, well, babies: they scream, howl, cry and then when they get a little older they babble incessantly and you always wonder what they are really trying to say.

Jordan came out of the womb with a look on his face that said, "I can't speak yet, but just wait."

Once he could speak, once he could utter even a few words anyone could understand, that look suddenly made a lot more sense.

And I started to question his paternity.

My mind started to play games on me: perhaps I'd had a horrible one night stand with David Spade that I had blocked out and somehow I had given birth to his love child.

Jordan has been blessed, or cursed, depending on who you ask (i.e. teacher vs mom) with absurd comic timing, always ready to drop the right phrase or word at the right moment. The more shocking, the better.

I once had a roadside fortune teller mention that I had two kids. When I explained that no, I have three, she said, 'oh, you were not supposed to have three kids, you were only supposed to have two. One of those kids was not meant for you, he is a hitchhiker, and you know which one it is.'

I knew it! Maybe I need to contact David Spade for a paternity test?

Fortune teller or not, he has always marched to his own drum, and we love that about him.

Well, most of the time. Unless he is mentioning Donald Duck in a group full of people, in which case it's no longer funny.

Even though they didn't drop him off until 10pm, as my mind was fading and I was half covered with facial cream, he came into my room, grinning, and talking quickly, excited about his mini-vacation right around the corner.

Here is how the conversation went, no breaths, no pauses, me in facial cream stopping to listen:

"So mom we went to Splashtown twice and it rained one day and I rode the Texas Free Fall and got a bad wedgie but the next time I went down it wasn't so bad and we shot off all kinds of fireworks on the fourth of July and a lady came out and told us she was gonna call the police on us because she had to go work the next day and Daniels dad is really crazy sometimes but its okay cause I wasnt scared or anything hes crazy in a good way and oh by the way, my right testicle hurts but its not swollen and Daniels mom said it might be a hemorrhoid do you think I have a hemorrhoid mom and what is that anyhow?"

SCREEECCHH
(There's that record scratching again. That seems to happen a lot with Jordan.)
Leave it to Jordan to mention an aching testicle and hemorrhoids in one breath, at 10:30 at night, hamburger in one hand, Coke in the other, wearing Daniels clothes (still not sure about the underwear, I didn't ask) and telling me his testicle hurts like he would tell me if he stubbed his toe. And I still hadn't removed my face cream.

That's what makes Jordan, Jordan.

He's missing that embarassment filter the rest of us were born with.

And it never fails.

I've been married almost twenty years and anytime we have a problem like a broken pipe, flat tire, or aching testicles on my almost 12 year old son, my husband is far, far away.

I calmly explained that a hemmorhoid and aching testicle occur in different body parts, and then proceeded with the normal mom/nurse questions: is it swollen (it wasn't), when does it hurt, how often, and decided an external exam could wait until my husband got off that boat.

And then I made one of those in the moment, executive mom decisions: If I must do an exam, I'm looking at the testicles first.

Robert can check him for hemmorhoids.

Sorry honey, you snooze you lose and I get to pick which ailment I'm examining for if it gets that far.

Then I started to think. Hemorrhoid?

I was still confused on that one and after some discussion and questions and pointing to certain body areas, I realized he meant hernia.

"Oh yeahhhhh, Daniels mom said hernia, not hemorrhoid. I got them mixed up. When can I go back to his house? We stayed up all night. Did I tell you what else we did..."

He chattered along like he had been gone on a long backpacking trip to Europe and had just returned home after months away.

Eventually, I finally got my face cream off.

No bodily searches have been needed yet, thank goodness.

Welcome home, Jordan. We missed you.

In a few years, you'll know all about the differences between a hemorrhoid and a hernia.