A Fitting End

Cinemas worldwide will be packed this weekend, as the last film of what is likely to be the bestselling children's book series of all time hits the screens.

Harry Potter has played a huge part in many lives this past decade and a half, least of all my own. My nephew was born the year the first book was published, and read the series as avidly as I did when he was older.

I first heard about the Harry Potter books from my sister's ex-boyfriend. Curious, I bought the first book and found it an interesting read, with strong echoes of Roald Dahl. Upon learning the author was British, I asked my sister, then at university in London, to bring home the second book for me, and the third when it came out in paperback, as they were unavailable in local bookstores at the time.

By the end of Book 3, I realised that Rowling had gone beyond her literary influences and indeed created a world that was nothing less than magical. A first edition Book 4 was my first ever Amazon.co.uk purchase, with a copy that was delivered to my parents' London flat just in time for their return trip to Manila.

With Bloomsbury editions unavailable in my country, (Scholastic has the rights to publish and sell Harry Potter books in America and the Philippines) I had to find other ways to complete my collection. Book 5 was purchased online and brought home by a colleague who was in Singapore at the time of the release. Book 6 was bought at a Hong Kong bookshop (it seems that former UK colonies sell UK editions, and former American colonies sell US ones) when my best friend's family were there on holiday right after it went on sale.

Book 7, being the last, was special. I wanted to be in London, queueing up outside a bookshop for the midnight release, but my life had other plans. Little A was born two days before the final book was launched worldwide, and while my fellow fans spent July 7, 2007 with their noses buried in their books, I was in hospital, nursing and burping a newborn every two hours.

Little A's godmother took my last book home from Edinburgh in time for his christening, a full two months after its release. It was the longest wait I'd ever had to make for a Harry Potter book, but I hardly noticed it, what with colic and nappies and sleeplessness.

When I started reading, in fits as my baby slept, I didn't mind the wait at all. The series got ever better as it advanced, and the ending was no less magical than I had hoped for. These books have been reread numerous times, and will be read again in years to come.

The films are equally memorable, as they chronicle my relationship with Big A quite well. We watched every movie on the first day of release from the same seats in the same cinema until it shut down after the third film, which I had to watch on my own as Big A was at a golf tournament. He knew better the next time though, and made sure he was always free on the day a new movie was released.

We saw the last one today, and I thought it was done just as wonderfully as the book ended. And we do not bid the series farewell, but look forward to Little A enjoying it in years to come.

Fantastic Four

Four years old. This year, for the first time ever, Little A blew out his birthday candles. On the day itself, we fed his classmates and gave them goodie bags, and then had a quiet lunch with his cousins and grandparents at the weekend.

Little A knows birthdays are special, and has been looking over the photographs and watching videos of previous celebrations as if to show us he remembers. He counts on his fingers and smiles sweetly when we get to number four, and sometimes brings us his birthday candle so he can practice blowing it out.

One thing we have noticed is that he is much calmer these days. The time for tantrums seems to have passed (fingers crossed!) and he understands that he can't always get what he wants, when he wants it.

Happy Birthday, Little A. May you stay healthy and happy and continue to grow in all the ways you can. We love you.

Back to School

Little A went back to school last week, and I marveled at how far we have come in 2 1/2 years.

When he started playschool at 16 months, we pulled him out after 3 months, because he couldn't engage with the teachers and didn't seem interested in the group activities. A year later, I enrolled him in a preschool twice a week, and not only were his teachers terrible, he was bullied constantly.

Midway through this first semester, we finally got his ASD diagnosis. He began therapy, but when I asked if he needed a shadow teacher and a more structured school program, his clueless teachers couldn't give me an answer. He spent most of that semester crying, and I gritted my teeth and waited until he moved into the next class, hopefully with better teachers.

When the schoolyear started last year and he started attending classes thrice a week, we were finally advised to find him a shadow teacher, a process that took close to three months to complete. Once they had adjusted to each other and the regular teachers, Little A began to really enjoy school.

By the time classes ended last March, it was difficult to tear him away at the end of a day. He happily attended his summer classes, and come this month, when he has been enrolled for daily classes, he bounces into the room without even waving me goodbye.

While he still has a way to go yet before he will be "big school ready", he has shown great improvements in being able to tolerate sitting with the group, following the class schedule and the like.

Academically, he is ahead of his age group in some ways - reading and spelling, but he needs work with writing. We're working on math skills now, and hopefully he will prove as astute with numbers as he is with letters.

Saying Goodbye to Summer

We managed to squeeze in a single trip before the summer ended. Our regular mountain visit took place the week before Little A went back to school.

This time around, apart from the usual time spent at the day care centre and visits to see horses (he is still afraid to ride them but loves to watch them in action), he discovered Guitar Hero. A pair of big boys were very accommodating, and allowed him to interrupt and then join their music time.

We also visited a museum nearby, and spent plenty of time in the fresh mountain air. Now we are back and ready for a new school year.

Dying Young

The world was supposed to end today. For most of us, it didn't. But for some, it did. Round about the time the Rapture was supposed to take place, the husband of a dear friend lost his battle with cancer and went ungently into the good night.

Death happens. We all know that. Yet we manage, most of the time, to keep ourselves removed from its reality. Until it happens to someone we love, and we realise that it comes to regular people, not just terrorists or criminals, but everyday people who make a living, care for their families, and just get through the days like we do.

My dear friend, at age 34, is now a widow. We, her friends, are devastated, and very much aware of our mortality. What can we do, what can we say, to make things easier for her to bear? To make it less painful for her to see her husband's remains cremated and fly them to the other side of the world, where he came from, and then pick up what was left of their life together, alone?

There are no words to express this kind of sorrow. Or perhaps there are, only I can't find them yet. All I can hope for is that when he went, he did indeed feel Rapture.

The Count

By accident, just the way we found out he could read, I discovered Little A could count beyond 20. He has a magnetic calendar board with the days of the week and months of the year, so he can stick on the dates from day to day if he wants to.

For a long time, he only played with the hands of the clock on this board, pointing out the numbers from 1-12. Then one day he took notice of the date numbers. More quickly than I expected, and without any help from anyone, he put the numbers 1-31 in order and looked for more. The iPad has an app that counts until 50, so clearly he's been paying attention to this. There is also a poster on his wall with numbers up to 100, and he's been pointing to these one by one and asking us to count for him.

So - reading, check! Counting, check! Next comes simple Maths. My Waterloo. I do hope I'm up to this.

Me Time

As every mother knows, there are never enough hours in a day. Getting the kids ready and to and from school, driving them to and from their other activities, grocery shopping, doing laundry, cooking, and trying to squeeze in work besides - it's no wonder there is a day set aside in our honour. What is a wonder is that it is only one day in a year.

One of the things that comes last on a mother's list of priorities is herself. Where once she would enjoy a few hours a week on her own, to get a manicure, go to the gym or quietly read, there is now a whole barrage of other, more pressing, things to get done in that time. "Me" time for mothers is reduced to a ten minute bath or five minute shower, and even that is rarely uninterrupted.

One of my goals this year (and last year, come to that) is to try and get back into shape. I've put on some pounds where I don't want them to be, and feel decidedly unfit. Last year, I managed a grand total of TWO exercise classes. This year I signed up for four to start with. Two are done, and I feel like I'm inching toward that fitness goal. There's a long way to go, but if I only steal an hour and a half per week for myself til the end of the year, I may yet achieve it.