22 is one more than 21
that big important birthday everyone gets all excited about
but you don’t even really like to drink
you’d rather make tea which you keep adding bags and more water to for hours
before heading off to bed

22 is 2 elevens
which is, you know
middle school
not anyone’s finest hour, but somehow you were still you
not still the quiet preschooler,
not yet the confident young woman
just sweet enough to get away with the snippy of early adolescence

22 is 11 twos
two they call terrible
but you were mostly just the
most adorable you could ever imagine
with those cute red stripes on your pajamas
and the curl of your hair
your voice figuring out all the words
and you already loving to draw and make playdoh creations
mostly with Granny
You did always want a banana as a bed time snack, which you wanted to peel yourself, but couldn’t.
“Nin nana!” You would demand. You called yourself Nin.
I guess I remember a few terrible tantrums about that. I used to try to sneak help you – digging my nail into the place right under the banana stem and praying you didn’t notice
You mostly noticed.
Like you noticed if I started to fall asleep reading about Charlie Mouse in the Richard Scary book we read every night.
“You made a mistake!” You’d laugh at me, and for some reason that became a demand for the book. You wanted me to make a mistake, or the book wasn’t worth reading anymore.

22 is 22 ones
when you were one you toddled around
nursed to sleep each night
probably waking up
a lot – remember you were a backwards sleeping baby
Slept through the night until 4 months or so, and then never again as a baby
you talked
somewhere I have a list of all the words you said at that age
”mo,” when you wanted more, and
at some point that year you started calling grapes “erdeps.”
“Nin, mo erdeps?”

22 is 1 twenty-two
Makes no sense
because you were just a baby
doing that baby elbow stretch
in your zip up pajamas
attached to me all day
and now you are this actual grown up
a friend
who makes me tea
and makes me proud