Today was Xander’s first communion. In the course of milestones, that’s a pretty big one. He had a lot of preparation and work to do in order to get ready for today. As I’ve said before, this allows Xander to continue on his own spiritual journey by getting some basis on some form of spirituality. As Xander’s parents, Kathy and I’ve chose Catholicism since we were both brought up in it and are familiar with the positive and negative sides of it.
Big milestones like this get to come with fun events like presents and special meals. Kathy’s folks gave Xander a whole lot of money and a new personal Bible (funny considering Kathy’s mom is anti-spriitual). We gave Xander an iPod (which caused a huge tado with Mitchell but that’s another story). Afterwards, we took Xander out for a special meal. Pizza is his favorite food so we took him to the California Pizza Kitchen.
Kathy and I haven’t been to California Pizza Kitchen in forever. It’s changed quite a bit. In addition to all the wild pizza’s they have, they have quite a bit of other things, many of which center around asian cuisine. We all enjoyed ourselves greatly. I was happy to give Xander what he wants and not to have to have pizza for myself.
An quick aside:
as we were leaving, we saw Bill and Melinda Gates and their family strolling in to have a family lunch. All very casual! You would never know they are one of the riches families in the world if you didn’t know who they are. They really did just look like any family going into a restaurant to have lunch.
In working at Microsoft for 12 years, I’ve worked with Bill a bunch times and met Melinda maybe twice though in no way would I say we knew each other. In working with him, I was one of his many minions doing a job. He was always polite to me when it was just me and him or small groups (him, me and 1 other person). In larger groups, he could get rough but I never really faced that directly and I’d like to think it was because I always had my pieces together (not the same story with Steve Balmer but that is for another time).
Anyway, I think that all went well for Xander’s special day. He’s out on the porch listening to his new iPod right now. Maybe I’ll join him with a book in a minute!