If your social media feeds are filled with as much awfulness as mine these days, you might appreciate this timeline cleanse which features Uncle Andy playing cars with his nephew Jaxon Layne. It’s one of my favorite photos and always brings joy whenever it happens across my phone or laptop.
We recently had a fun birthday dinner for Landrie, and Jaxon was there entertaining all of us. I may have inadvertently encouraged use of a bad word, forgetting that children will listen. I was kidding around with Noah and instructing him to just “Do the shit!” his father had asked him to do, and Jaxon heard every word perfectly, precisely repeating my scream of “Do the shit!” in the next room.
My training of and engagement with the twins didn’t begin in earnest until they were about five or six years old – Jaxon’s education may start earlier, and he may ready for the man, the myth, and the bad influence of Uncle Al. As Auntie Mame instructed Mr. Babcock, “Knowledge is power!”
It should go without saying that my favorite Dazzlers are those whom I’ve actually met in real life. My very favorites among those are family members (see Mom, Paul, and Dad) and my super favorites among those are the chosen family who aren’t forced to be here (see Andy and Suzie and now today’s recipient). That means choosing Landrie Leone as Dazzler of the Day is a very happy moment, and long-overdue. As mother to Jaxon Layne, she will always hold a special place in my heart, and in addition to that she’s become a surrogate Mom to the twins, keeping a home together no matter how challenging things get. It’s not always easy coming into the Ilagan family, and sometimes you just need the right people to make things click and fall into better place.
Today is Landrie’s birthday, and until we can make it through the snow to deliver her gift, this Dazzler of the Day crowning will be a placeholder present. Happy Birthday Landrie!
Today marks my mother’s birthday, and since she is a lady I won’t reveal her actual age (which I may have already done at some point so don’t go snooping in the archives to prove how rude my former selves may have been). If you see Laurie Ilagan today, wish her a Happy Birthday! I’ll be doing so in person, but I’ll do it here as well.
Pulling back from participating or fostering family involvement has been one of the most unexpectedly game-changing moves I’ve made of late, and it comes from a natural and mutual removal of my presence for various reasons. Family will always be family – that won’t change, nor would I want that to change. My responses and engagement, however, have changed, and my participation and proactive attempts at being included have dropped entirely off – mostly unnoticed, so apparently I wasn’t doing all that much before this.
It’s been an integral component in how stress-free this particular holiday season has been, and I’m looking to expand upon it even more going forward. Too many of us force ourselves to keep the same detrimental patterns and cycles going just for the sake of family. We subject ourselves to tension and discomfort and repeated situations where we are shown in action and deed how little we are thought of or understood, and we return for more of the same hurtful behavior over and over because… family.
I’m not buying into that anymore, and I say that without any specific grievances in mind because history is enough. Breaking such cycles us actually a way of getting closer to family – it allows for more honest relationships, and a clarity in what we will accept. It also delineates boundaries – something that many families deliberately discount because they’re family. There’s something intrinsically destructive about that, and it’s easy to get lost in the messed-up patterns that we take part in perpetuating.
Personally, I’m learning what I want my place to be, and it’s a good shift. Best of all, no one has really noticed, further evidence of what matters and what doesn’t.
My brother led us deeper into Chinatown to a place he and Noah had gone before, where an enormous crab covered in ocean dust guarded the entrance and lorded over a collection of lobsters in a fluorescently-lit tank. It was already after eleven o’clock but a large table of at least ten sat in a corner finishing their meal, and another group of six was coming in behind us. Chinatown has traditionally been the place to grab a late-night meal when other places have shut down.
We ordered family-style – some soup, some duck, some pork, some Chinese cabbage, some rice – and as we filled ourselves I recounted the first time we had Peking Duck – at the wedding of our cousin in New Jersey when we were just children. Telling Noah about it, we realized that I remembered it better than my brother, though the reminder brought back the way the dish was served. We didn’t delve too deeply into conversation as it was nearing midnight, and really, it was enough just sharing a meal together.
The wait staff were starting to get antsy too, so we finished just about everything on the plates before us, piled on our coats, and made motions to head back into the cold night, reasonably warmed and fortified. Before stepping out, we came up with a game plan for getting home: we would walk out of the traffic entanglement of Chinatown, head down to the Four Seasons overlooking the Public Garden and splurge on an Uber from there to the condo.
Three Ilagan gentlemen weaved their merry way through Chinatown, over a hundred years of living between the three of us – and soon found ourselves skirting Boston Common and a stretch of trees lit in various Christmas colors. My brother asked about Kira then, saying he had seen I’d written something about it but hadn’t read it, and I was suddenly touched by his remembering, as well as by the return of my old friend to this holiday season, if only by reference and recall.
It struck me then as we crossed the midnight hour, that this was the Holiday Stroll. Without planning or fanfare or even the most rudimentary understanding of how it all happened, we were in the middle of our very first Midnight Holiday Stroll, and my brother and nephew were part of it. Sometimes tradition finds a way of happening even when you’ve given up on it. As we walked past the Boston Public Garden, site of our very first Holiday Stroll – we ducked into the Four Seasons and looked at Uber rates. They were starting at $30 for just a few blocks, which seemed criminal, and, truth be told, I wasn’t quite ready to end our walk, so we continued on, my brother and my nephew and me.
When left to our own devices, my brother and I usually get along quite well, and I was just starting to see how other family members have inadvertently set us up in adversarial roles over the years, through various expectations and unfair comparisons. Comparison is the thief of joy, especially when used among siblings. We may not have realized that in time, but we were together now, and there was still the love of two brothers between us, and that’s all that mattered on this night.
It’s been years since my brother and I spent any time together in Boston, which seems a little sad given how much we each love the city and how easy it would be to meet up here. Alas, the years went by and nothing ever lined up until this day, when he and my nephew Noah were in town for a show at House of Blues, and I was preparing for a holiday gathering the following weekend.
With Kira off the grid, I welcomed the presence and distraction of my brother – and if you know my brother at all you know there is no greater presence or distraction. On this Saturday afternoon, it was precisely what I wanted – and as I returned to the condo after a few more errands, I was happy to find him and Noah there, where Christmas lights twinkled and holiday music played on the little stereo. The decorations I’d put up hadn’t been totally wasted then, and as I lit a few candles the afternoon glowed inside as the outside grew dark.
The three of us sat around the table overlooking Braddock Park, a random assorted of cheese, crackers olives and soda on a board messily assembled without rhyme or reason. An atmosphere of holiday coziness settled around us, and my brother recalled his and Noah’s late-night Chinatown dinner tradition; they’d spent several post-show/post-game nights over dinners in Chinatown – one of the things I used to do with Kira. He said they would do it again that night and invited me to join them after the show. I said that would work, and asked them to text me when they were done, at which point I’d meet them at the Boylston stop since they’d be coming from Fenway – we could walk from there to Chinatown and have a late dinner.
While they headed out for their show I brought my notebook to a nearby cafe for an hour or two of cafe culture, whereupon I began the ramblings of this recounting (and yesterday’s posts). By the time I returned to the condo to get ready for dinner, it was beginning to feel a lot more like Christmas. ‘Meet Me In St. Louis’ was playing on the television and I decided to get a head start to the Copley T station while soaking in the festive fireplace environs of the Lenox Hotel lobby.
Pulling a hood over my head and letting a long coat billow behind me, I hurried down the stairs to the street below and made my way through the Southwest Corridor Park then down Dartmouth toward the Lenox and its fire-lit warmth. Merry-makers decked out in holiday finery sat around the fireplace, but a chair was open for the taking, and I sank it, quickly warming to the picturesque scene. Soon – too soon, really, as I was just slipping into a relaxed state for the first time that weekend – my brother was calling, telling me they were on their way. I pulled my coat back on and headed out, arriving at the Boylston station a few minutes before they got there.
We walked to Chinatown, recalling that holiday classic ‘Gremlins’ and its opening scenes of pricing a Mogwai. I told Noah the story of how his Dad and I saw it in the theater when it opened, and how sick I got, either from fear or summer heat – and almost didn’t make it home without throwing up in our neighbor’s caravan. Ah, to be a kid in the 80’s…
Decades later, and after several years of distance, my brother and I were back in Boston, walking to dinner in Chinatown with his son, and uncertainly completing a circle, one circle of several on our journey.
Upon returning from a weekend of adventures in Virginia, the very last thing I wanted to do was host and entertain a couple of teenagers, I don’t care if they are related to me by blood, but when Andy sent out the invite and the twins accepted, I couldn’t refuse and risk not retaining my hard-earned most-fun-guncle title. So it was that the day after getting home a little before midnight, after an eleven-hour journey with the bestie, I found myself cleaning up the guest rooms for Noah and Emi, who by our calculations hadn’t been over together for a sleepover since early summer, when the Island called to us…
That feels far away and quaint now.
The twins have been through a lot of late, but that’s not my story to tell – not yet at least – and I wanted to mark the new moon by sharing a burning ritual with them. We wrote down the various things we wanted to let go – all those nagging thoughts and bothersome habits we trick ourselves into thinking we need. Noah’s list was short – Emi and I had a few more to evict from our minds.
As we headed outside to burn them, a snow squall moved in, along with the accompanying wind. It made the burning ceremony a bit more difficult, especially for Emi’s list, which initially refused to take flame – a signal from the universe perhaps of how much difficulty she was having in letting certain things go.
Eventually, it began to burn – fire fighting against snow, rendering its small patch of space into water, burning a hole in the atmosphere and parting the weather like some religious prophecy. I watched the light dance on the faces of my niece and nephew, as snowflakes perched in their hair and on their shoulders. We agreed there was a new lightness that came with the ritual, then headed back into the attic to warm up before it was time for them to depart.
As we have entered the holiday season, I’ll put up the small, spindly tree I have for the attic, unadorned save for a strand of simple white lights, and start making that space a little cozier should the twins want to visit again, and indulge their crazy Uncle in his crazy rituals.
Last weekend we had Noah over for a jam-packed Saturday sleepover following his soccer game. (He’s still fundraising for his team, and only about halfway to his goal, so if you’re so inclined please check out the donation page here.) We had Suzie’s family over for a pizza dinner, and when that was done Noah and I headed out for a late showing of ‘Superman’ (and a 10:25 PM start time for a movie is just too late for my old ass, but I did it).
The next morning we woke early to avoid the rush of brunch at Cafe Madison, then hit the road for a spur-of-the-moment trip to Manchester, Vermont to get the Maple Creme that Suzie I discovered at The Maple Reserve. It was Noah’s first time trying one of these amazing treats, and he confirmed it was worth the drive.
Whenever I hang out with the twins, I learn something. Sometimes it’s a new way of looking at life, sometimes it’s a new app or setting to take a picture on my phone, and sometimes it’s a little deeper – like some treatise on time itself – how it moves, how it repeats, how it evolves and keeps us going.
Noah is almost a young man, and I feel how quickly time is rushing us along.
Tomorrow would have marked my Dad’s 95th birthday, had he lived that long, but 92 was a good run, and we remember and celebrate him a little bit each day since he left. As tomorrow is 9/11, and this site has always gone dark on that day, I’m writing this little tribute a day early, and posting it just before the midnight hour.
An impromptu and unplanned visit to the cemetery revealed the beauty of a September afternoon. Dad was born on what has typically been a beautiful day – a day when summer’s warmth still lingers, but the comforting coolness of fall has seeped into the night to take the edge off. Like me, Dad was a true-blue Virgo – organized, punctual, perfectionist, exacting, critical, and grounded. It served him well, and I learned a great deal from such order, because I saw how easier things could be when executed properly and done well.
At the top of the hill where he rests, a cool breeze blows beneath the afternoon sun. Clouds roll dramatically across the sky and stalks of goldenrod nod in the distance. A patch of wilderness on the edge of the cemetery is littered with wildflowers still in bloom. While the roses have gone, leaving their hips and thorny warnings, purple and pink blooms have taken their place, gorgeously placed against foliage about to fade from chartreuse to yellow – a reverse return to spring’s original color scheme. Nature loves a full circle.
The wind has grown colder, and I don’t mind it. It feels fitting, like a gentle initiation into the fall to come. When I reach down to place my hand on Dad’s name, the dark stone is still quite warm from the sun. It surprises me – I expected it to be cool to the touch. The unlikely heat reminds me that there is still life here, and that Dad is still with me.
Noah: You want me to give advice to your readers that are much older than me?
Uncle Al: Exactly. Hit it.
Noah: Stay consistent in what you do, you know? I don’t really know what it’s like to be an adult. Find something you like doing and stick with it. Umm, be humble.
Uncle Al: This is very general, very vague. What specifically have you learned in your own life?
Noah: You know what I think? Don’t be jealous of other people cause I feel like people my age are jealous. I look up to myself, I don’t look up to other people.
Uncle Al: That is very wise. Anything else to add before I close out this post?
Noah: Umm… what do you mean?
Uncle Al: I mean, what would you like to say to someone who’s been reading my blog for years?
Noah: Thank you for all the support. Glad they enjoy the writing. Have a good day.
“Your Uncle needs a hug today,” I said as I surprised the twins at their summer jobs with their favorite Starbucks drinks. It was the second anniversary of Dad’s death, and after I visited the cemetery and Mom, I needed a little bit of joy, and a glimpse of the family future. After confirming their work locations (they had summer jobs at two parks in Amsterdam, where they had to entertain the younger kids who visited) I stopped by to see Emi first, followed by Noah, and spent a few minutes talking and enjoying what was actually quite a beautiful summer moment in a summer that didn’t quite have enough of them.
When I stop to think about it, I don’t envy being a kid today. Especially over the past decade, when a pandemic shut down schools and technology threatens to overwhelm, I realize how lucky I am to have grown up in a world without social media and cel phones. These kids don’t have such quaint luxuries, and they’ve already had to contend with more than any child should, so this is my little tribute to the twins for managing to turn into decent teenagers in spite of the madness that sometimes swirls around them. Too often we focus on the bad things that kids do, and the way the future sometimes looks bleak – may this serve as a reminder that there is still hope here, and I see it whenever I see my niece and nephews.
Emi and Noah, you’re doing all right, and better than I could imagine doing if I were in your shoes, so keep leading the noble lives you are leading and you will always make us proud. Whenever you need a little extra love or support, your Uncle Andy and I are here. (Now get ready to celebrate your Uncle Al’s 50th birthday at dinner tonight because he’s old and needs your flattery.)
Hello little guy! How have we already made it to your third birthday?! It seems like only yesterday we were welcoming you into this world on that hot summer week in July 2022… and here you are walking and running and playing with no end in sight to your shenanigans. You have charmed us all – and you already share a love of cars with your Uncle Andy, whom you gravitate to every time we visit.
You’re just beginning your journey here, and everything must feel new and exciting to you – it’s a joy and wonder to see the world through your eyes, and you’ve given your Lola a renewed sense of purpose and joy that she must have needed. Pretty soon you’ll be old enough to start some of the adventures that your brother and sister have been a part of over the years, and we’ll start bringing you around for summer pool days and fall treasure hunts and cozy holiday gatherings. Until then, enjoy your third birthday – we’ll see you on Saturday to celebrate!
It’s difficult to get a moody teenager to smile, especially when you want to take their picture. I say this as someone who well remembers his moody moments (and who still succumbs to them even as he stalks and approaches 50). So without much analysis or reason, I present this fun pic that I managed to get of the Ilagan twins right after I took them to get Starbucks. Caffeine and sugar work for a brief window of time – just enough to pass them off to someone else for the crash.
As the reigning matriarch in our family, she has watched as we have grown and evolved, bringing us back together and reminding us how important family will aways be. Thanks for everything, Mom – enjoy this day!
Over the past few weeks, I’ve had my first solo dinners with each of the twins – Noah and Emi – just as they enter their 15th year. It’s strange to sit across from a young adult whom you remember as a tiny baby – strange in the realization of the passage of time, strange in seeing how quickly children grow up, strange in how suddenly older I feel. It’s a happy sort of strangeness, knowing this is the way life should progress.
I hope I’ve taught them a few things over these past fifteen years, and I’ve lost count of how many things they have taught me. As we prepare for another summer (with a theme once again chosen by Emi) there is excitement in the air, and the start of a possible new dining tradition.
Nipping at their heels is baby Jaxon, who’s quickly gaining on them as he approaches his third birthday this summer… Life is rushing by, and even capturing the moments in pictures like this doesn’t seem to slow it down.
