30 Days of Thanks: Day 15

Today I am thankful for..."like father, like son."

The hubby loves the space program. There was a time in his life when he wanted to be an astronaut. Really, really wanted to be an astronaut. Too bad his eyesight and complicated relationship with heights and airplanes has kept him grounded.

But he's still close to the program. There are many nights we've stayed up until the wee hours to watch a shuttle return home on the NASA channel. We've been to the National Air and Space Museum annex at Dulles Airport where he was like a kid in a candy store. He's researching the missions for the next few years so we can plan a trip to see a launch in person before the shuttle is out of service in 2010. He still gets sincerely emotional at the Challenger disaster. So much so that when I saw the Columbia disaster on the TV screens as I was running through O'Hare to make a tight connecting flight to LA, my first thought was to call him to make sure he was okay, risking my spot on the flight. His knowledge of the science and physics related to the program and each launch is truly amazing.

Last night, the shuttle was slated to lift off at 8pm ET. He managed to wrangle peanut onto the potty and into the bath early so that he was diapered, lotioned and pajamed in plenty of time to watch the last checks of "go's" and "no-go's" at the 9 minute countdown mark. He even managed to get a two-year-old to sit still during the countdown, explaining as much as he could in two-year-old terms.

Then, the hubby held peanut's hand and they watched lift-off with the same expressions of awe on their faces. I admit to missing half of the launch, instead watching the two of them watch it. Peanut kept pointing and saying "space ship" with a huge grin on his face. This morning, he asked repeatedly to watch the space ship again and again and again (and because the hubby recorded the hour of replays the NASA channel airs from 70 different angles, they watched it again and again and again).

Seeing this obsession passed so easily from father to son has been so sweet to watch. I am thankful for one more thing that they can share together. I am thankful for peanut's sense of curiosity that he most certainly inherited from the hubby. I am thankful that I was able to witness the same childlike excitement in both the hubby and my son as they shared this experience.

Of course I spent the rest of the evening telling peanut there was no way he was ever going to travel in space, drive a race car or play a football position that has a high rate of injury. I may be thankful, but I'm still his mommy.