Eighteen

You with some of the band you assembled to record "Fervor"

Today, Max Benjamin, you are turning eighteen. 

The end of childhood for my youngest child.

As with your sister, this will be the last birthday letter for you that I'll be publishing on the blog. It's basically the only thing I've published here for the last few years anyway, but you often encourage me to keep writing. You've become quite a writer yourself these days, of music and of essays, short stories and songs.

I've been incredibly fortunate to have an often (literal) front row seat to all that you do. This year has been filled with music, including your outstanding soloist award at the Mingus competition and performance at Joe's Pub, being a "Teen Leader Teen Leader" with HaZamir and sharing fuzzballs, joining Beantown Swing and performing all over Boston, composing "Fervor" and recording it for the Ellington competition, self-directing the Triplet Feel trio with Nikhil and Bennett into Mingus for this coming year, and "fucking smashing" your audition to the Berklee College of Music during 5-week this summer. My favorite text of the year had to be "Low key tho, Berklee is starting to feel like home" - good thing you get to spend the next four years there!

You drive yourself everywhere (thank you for that) and always make time to watch Saturday Night Live with me (it gets better, but iguanas!). You're very conscious of your phone use, which I do admire, even if it means fewer reels get shared. You and Hannah are tremendously supportive of each other, and I know that's going to continue on. And while Shira is disappointed in your choice not to attend Couch University, she's happy to know that you are always an advocate for couching. 

The name of my group chat with you and Hannah is "The Kids," but I feel like I need a new word to describe this next part of our lives. While I feel very fortunate that I can continue to guide and support you as a parent, I feel like we are genuinely friends as well, and you are my favorite people to be with. Writing all of these letters, I've tried to capture, for a moment, the essence of who you are. But then I found this quote from Charles Mingus himself, "I'm trying to play the truth of what I am. The reason it's difficult is because I'm changing all the time." How lucky that we continue to change, all of us.

I couldn't be any prouder. Happy birthday, buddy. I love you so much.

(You can also see letters for ages three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine, ten, eleven, twelve, thirteen, fourteen, fifteen, sixteen and seventeen.)