Tuesday: Ben wakes up.

Tuesday: Eli waits for the rain to go away.

Wednesday: Ben now has a tiny cast to correct his club foot. It will be changed every week for a few months, then there are shoes attached in the middle by what looks like a little skateboard that he will wear for years, and eventually a simple operation. When I expressed sympathy, not just for him but for his mother, she reminded me that the second son of her best friend from childhood has life-threatening kidney problems; another friend’s child has a serious genetic condition. “This is nothing,” she said. “A foot that’s easily fixed.”

Like I said, she’s magnificent. And so, in their very different ways, are her boys.

And so, if I may say so, is MY boy.