Coloring Without Borders: You don't know Jack

"Daddy, when I am a grown up, can I wear your underwear?"

Jackson is my raison d'être. I while away my days as a stay-at-home dad. Like any parent, my kid is usually a major focal point of whatever I'm doing. By default, he's the most frequent model and muse on this site.

This isn't truly a daddy blog, however. At least, not designedly. But the kid does take up most of my time and energy. My days are spent with him, our travels are influenced by his presence, and our expat lives are reflected back to us by him. Over the past couple of years he has spent nearly every waking hour with me; only recently has nursery eaten into that time. He's my constant companion; my interrogator; my pride and my exasperation; my protégé and my master; my worry and my triumph. My mini-me.

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http://www.coloringwithoutborders.com/2014/04/a-boy-and-his-cat.html

A boy and his cat

Blood. Tears. Mayhem. That's how it would end.

They were across the room. I could see Jack's windup. He wasn't moving in slow-motion — life's not a genre of fanboy stylized violence, like a Tarantino film — but in real time. Even if I had foreseen the danger, I'm not fast enough to stop a blow from 30 feet away.

Unstructured days

11:30      Girls at barbershop dote on Jack,
             plying him with his first taste (i.e.,
                 dozens) of Gummi Bears. Jack
                 sees no reason to leave after
                 completion of haircut.

11:55      Jack holds my hand while he walks
               Sumo-style down the sidewalk
                 toward the car, obstructing
                 passersby

http://www.coloringwithoutborders.com/2013/12/a-boy-and-his-free-ipad.html

A boy and his free iPad

He cups his hand on the outside of my shoulder, looks deeply into my eyes, just inches from my face — Coach instructing his player — needing to explain, earnestly, ever so earnestly, he knows I'm slow on the uptake and he must help me understand: "Dad. Dad. I want red iPad."

http://www.coloringwithoutborders.com/2015/06/half-his-life-abroad-third-culture-kid.html

Half his life abroad: a third culture kid?

Is Jackson truly cross-cultural? His memories of the United States are vague at best; the States are simply a faraway place where the rest of his family lives. If he knows any culture, it's Scotland's.

But how much culture does a toddler — eeek, he's now a "preschooler" — really encounter?

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