Some wonderful friends invited us over for dinner last week because, you know, we were husbandless and daddy-less for all of four days. They have three boys (ages 2, 4, 6), and our boys totally adore their boys. Dinnertime in that house (and with the addition of the two Martin boys) is like a spectator sport. After a while, Jan and I just looked at each other, picked up our glasses of wine, sighed and nonverbally agreed that attempting to enforce manners or appropriate dinner table-behavior was just a little bit out of the question for the night. (The kids’ manners, that is, we’d still try to act in a socially acceptable way).

Ben, the six-year-old, and Matthew are great buds and are two peas in a pod. Both the oldest, both now in kindergarten, and both boys are a little bit more cautious and emotional about things. They’re just quite similar and get along smashingly well.

Well, Ben, all of a sudden noticed something about Matthew and just couldn’t contain his observation. He leaned over and said, “Matthew! Your ears are gigantic!!” Poor guy – the curse of the Martin ears strikes again.