Naptime. The great exhale of parenthood. The Kid slurps away on his thumb upstairs, and our family of three populates the house at once–a weekday rarity. The second winter storm in two weeks pelts ice at the windows, power threatening to go out, but for now we are heated and fed and together. Last time we weren’t. The Sis said it this morning and my thoughts echo it now, how there is thankfulness in all of us just being safe. In our biggest problem being boredom.

I feel protective of winter, the black sheep of seasons. Even as it drags on past the date a polite guest would leave, even when its gray days and early sunsets lap around the edges of my well-being and throw a wet blanket upon my attempts at maintaining a good mood, I appreciate it. I can’t imagine life without the rhythm it brings: the furor of life whittled down to a slow hum, the peace in a white landscape. Part of my appreciation stems from its faithfulness in exiting, eventually, setting the stage behind it for growth and life.

Winter is different from the rest. I can relate.

And now, as TK’s carbon headpiece peeks out from the corner of the monitor’s screen, I count how many minutes I have before he pops up, awake and ready to play. I count down how many days we have until the halo is removed–NINE!–and I know what I’m doing, hurrying time along in the way I’ve always been inclined to, moving to The Next Thing. Wondering, once the halo is off, when I should start potty-training. Which bed to buy. How to get him to drink through a straw. When he might begin to speak.

We went to a birthday party this weekend, the group one of good friends and kind faces, people who know our story and whispered the abridged version to their kids in preparation. TK buzzed around like he always does, checking out the surroundings and doing his own thing until he saw me with cake. The halo makes him different in a glaring way, a way that I’ve come to embrace with an air of defiance as we stroll around Trader Joe’s or haunt the aisles at Target: This is my boy. This is his thing. Stare all you want.

But there are other differences, too. He’s reserved. He withdraws to his own spot, sets up camp there in both familiar and unfamiliar places, and operates independently. He doesn’t warm up to people quickly. He observes–notices–everything. He likes to leave parties early.

I can relate.

I fight the urge to customize not just our home, or our life, but the world to him. Because there will be ways he bumps up against it that will hurt. There will be people who don’t understand him, even once the halo is gone. I suspect–and I have it on good authority, as one who knows something about this–that he may not feel comfortable in a lot of places. That he will look for ways to retreat to his comfort zone. That he will create worlds of his own (if I turn off the TV long enough) that seem to fit him better.

I could, of course, be totally wrong. He may end up being the varsity quarterback.

But if he isn’t–if the words come more slowly and less audibly for a while or even always, if he takes more time than most people to find his place and who he is–I remind myself that this is okay. This, in fact, is the beginning to some of the best biographies. This is what led me to New York and to writing and to this life that he punctuates, elevates, with his hard-won grin and matchless laugh, his tiny grip on my finger and his dive-bomb into my lap. These moments that are so easily swept away and missed as we glance at the clock, checking how close bedtime is, they turn out to be everything. And when parenthood threatens to be reduced to loads of laundry and a series of nos as it so often does because we are human, I’ll try to remember less the stain on his pants and more his glee at jumping into the puddle. I’ll try to remember the three days when we thought he may not walk for six weeks, and the miracle that is each jump.

When I do this, when I give each moment a name–grace–I am still prone to the bad moods and fits of self-righteousness and fear, but I am more likely to see them as an indulgence than a right. I see the choice I’ve been given. And I can give thanks for the thawing of spring, for the halo removal, for bedtime–and for every moment leading there.