I am going to have a little Ollie interlude here, but I’ll masterfully tie it in with the trip, in the end. That’s signposting, there.
He had his 18 month appointment last week. No one is more surprised that I that he is proportionately taller than he is wide. As I’ve mentioned, his portage is not unlike that of a watermelon, or English Bulldog, or ambulatory rugby ball, or Chief Wiggum, or Barney, or all of South Park. But his height was in the 80s and his weight was in the 50s, percentile-wise. He just concentrates it all so efficiently about his midriff. Actually I think he shot up in the past couple days and doesn’t seem quite as dense anymore, but Aaron are and I just hanging out in a hotel room again and the similes got away from us, metaphorically speaking.
He got an “incident report” from daycare the other day. He was the biting victim, it seems, but rather than saying he had been bitten by a friend, it specified that he had tried to take another kid’s toy and the other kid had bitten him in response. I found it entertaining that they sent home a report saying that he had been wronged, but made it clear that he had it coming.
He learns a new word or two every day now, although pronunciation-wise you can only understand them if you’re me or Dylan. He has traveled remarkably well this trip. Which isn’t to say he hasn’t had a few rough nights, but so has his nearly five-year-old sister, which is much harder to take, patience-wise. He’s able to participate in and enjoy most of what we’ve been doing, and we can tell that in another year we’ll hardly have to worry about any of the baby stuff and mostly be doing things all together. He is just a basically happy kid, whose hobbies are evil and destruction. Those things make him happy.
Anyway, the point is, here is what happened yesterday evening. We’re in the final hotel of our journey, a Sheraton that I’m told is the biggest in Boston. We have adjoining rooms so as to sequester ourselves from the children, which ended up working a little better than intended (and now foreshadowing! I’m just full of it over here). We had just been swimming, so all four of us were in various stages of bathing and dress. Ollie caused a diversion by pooping in the tub, which caused all sorts of mayhem and less focus on applying clothing than would normally be the case. Aaron manfully took on tub decontamination, while I wrestled a diaper on the boy child and Dylan flitted about without any clothes on complaining about being cold.
As soon as the diaper was on, Ollie scooted away, and before I could even turn around the door to the other room, the one containing: Ollie, all the luggage, and my room key, was closed from the other side. Meanwhile I was left in a towel without access to clothes, with Dylan (naked as mentioned) and Aaron in a bathing suit.
Oh no! I said. Do we have a room key? Yes! Aaron said. Don’t worry! I have one right here.
Then he said, all casual-like, The door is also latched to stop Ollie from running out. Do you have anything very thin and sturdy?
Then he disappeared into the hallway in his bathing suit and banged around purposefully for a few minutes. I let him convince me to put off calling security for the first minute, but after that he was in full agreement about involving door-opening professionals. Once the security guy realized the part about the latch he went to fetch some extra tools (They have a dedicated unlatching reachin’ tool! Doesn’t make you feel super secure in your room…). Meanwhile I could only catch every third word of what was happening outside the room. Aaron told me he had been fielding questions from many curious passers-by about why he was talking soothingly at the door in his bathing suit (your WHAT? is in there?). I also later learned (due to selective omission in the moment) that he had been trying to use his room key to unlatch the latch. The key fell under the door, but Ollie helpfully slid it back out.
Ollie remained cheerful throughout the 15-20 minutes it took to spring him. I guess the novelty of having his own pad kept him from completing the Demolition Circuit that he had worked out when we first checked in (crush creamer with bare hand, then eat it, throw coffee maker, call front desk, dip soap in toilet). Dylan and I chatted with him through the adjoining door and he chirped back at us. He liked the sliding things under the door game. There was a period of ominous silence in there. We may never know what happened. Receiving further instructions from his UFO is high on my list of theories.
He did seem happy to see us, in the end. We did have his beloved blankie though, so you never know.
Indeed. So, a new hotel room, which is right up there with cardboard boxes in entertainment value.
Dylan and cousin Noah were on the same page, celebrating-wise.
Here, let me help you feel some of the chaos yourself. Ollie would please like to nurse now, thanks.
I believe we established legal residence at this shoeshine booth.
Dylan and Ollie got to swim with eight or so relatives. No pictures there because Ollie needs like three people to prevent him from climbing out of the pool and hurling himself back in. I finally put one of those floaty backpacks on him at the Y yesterday and hey, all the wild kicking actually works for him. 
