Happy Birthday David!!!!

Happy 36th Birthday to my middle child, William David Bain. It was May 6, 1974 and I was thrilled to have a boy! In fact, I wanted and prayed for 4 boys so we could have a basketball team - I would be the 5th member, not Bill; he was always out buying antiques somewhere! What is the country song about sometimes "God's greatest gifts are unanswered prayers"?!! As it turned out, one boy was quite enough! David was home 3 days and then was in Texas Children's Hospital for 10 days with meningitis. God's grace got us through this and many more adventures in his lifetime!

David was a cute, white-headed, wild, energetic dare devil all of his life and now has two boys just like him. What goes around, comes around! He couldn't have cared less about girls, dressing up, Sunday School, choir at church, long car trips, piano lessons or school in general. He was most active at bed/bath time and the only reason he liked books was because it meant I had to read more and this postponed finally going to bed! He wasn't too high on swimming lessons. On the 2nd day of swim lessons I told him to go get ready and he said, "I already had it". I guess one day was good enough for him.

He loved his sisters, Jenny and Jaime, cars, boots, jeans with back pockets, puppies, all sports, dirt piles, his fort in the back yard, hanging Jaime's Cabbage Patch dolls by a rope from the balcony, cereal at 3:00 a.m. every night, his neighborhood buddies, drums, his snake "Lars", his grandparents and his cousins; in fact, he and Melissa got into much mischief, some of which, if printed, would probably incarcerate both of them! She was one year older than him and equally immature. His other cousin, Robyn, was older and more grounded than her sister! His girlfriend when he was young was Jennifer Turner; I asked him once who his girlfriend was and he said, "Turnerfer". That is what we still call her to this day. They once tried to find gold in a hill of dirt in our back yard while playing cowboys! One Valentine's day he was making cookies with me - one of those few days he was actually in the house and I knew where he was - he asked me, "when you fall in love, can you get up?" (Guess that depends on how hard you fall!!) I always hoped he would not really wear my wedding gown at his wedding!!

I asked him once what he wanted to be when he grew up and he said, "A doctor so I can see people naked" or "a fireman so I can start fires"! Where did I go wrong??? He left a note on the front door once that said, "Jenny, the house key is in the gas grill." To see the difference in he and Jenny....while they were gone one night, Jenny asked if I could tape President Bush's speech and Dave wanted me to tape "Bart Simpson". Unfortunately, he is his mother's child; I'd rather see Bart than Bush!

He was in several Christmas pageants at church and he liked those because he didn't have to sit still and listen; he could run wild through the church when it wasn't his turn on stage. I had to pay him 25 cents the first year to go on stage and be a pilgrim. The year before he was baby Jesus. One year he played the piano and one year was in a dance. He probably never told any of his friends about his pageant days! He told me once that Joan Brunson, the church pianist, was lucky because she didn't have to sing in the choir! After reading a Bible story one night, I asked him "where did Adam and Eve go when they got kicked out of the Garden of Eden?" and he said, "I don't know; I guess out to eat". Probably was a good answer! Like I said, he wasn't too high on church and I don't know that he learned much! He asked me once, "when I get married, do I have to marry a Baptist?" In a prayer at dinner one night he thanked God for Halloween and told God not to drive fast or the cops would get him!! He saw Bill Daniels (pageant Jesus) in a pickup one day and said, "I didn't know Jesus drove a truck?"

Dave loved being outside and loved all things physical. He was pretty coordinated and learned to ride a 2-wheel bike at age 3. He played football at 6 and was the shortest one on the team. I think he made one tackle but he loved the "costume" and helmet. He played baseball, basketball, snow and water skied and loved skateboarding. Bill and he and all the skaters built a half-pipe ramp in the driveway and they played on that all summer until the mean men in the homeowner's association made them take it down. The skaters all came over at midnight and tore it down with hammers and loud music!! They didn't go down easily! It was called "skate or die" and one mother wrote a permission slip that said, "Ozzie has my permission to skate or die"!! No one did; in fact there were never any broken bones!

Not on the skate ramp anyway! There were several other instances of broken bones, stitches, operations and bandaids. He had stitches early on from jumping off the dryer into the trash sack and cut his toe on a tin can lid! Being the loving mother that I am, I told Bill to just put a bandaid on it!! A little too much blood for that! He broke his collar bone twice; once on a dirt bike and once in football. His biggest collision was on a street bike when he ran into the back of a parked car - thank the Lord he had a helmet on! As he lay on the curb, bleeding everywhere he told the ambulance driver "not to tell my mother". It was a tad obvious. Broken jaw, split lip, broken tooth, blood clot in the cheek, face black and swollen....let's just say he got many strange looks in public! I tried to act like I didn't know him! Six months later he looked pretty normal again, thanks to Dr. Lee and God's grace! (I could have shown you much worse pictures!)

This didn't really slow him down much that summer; he even made baseball All-stars with his mouth wired shut. One his most favorite things to do is dirt bikes! He has even instilled this into his two boys. They rode from the time they were 4 and 5 years old. Grandma doesn't like it and it keeps me on my knees!! He has bungy jumped with Jenny over the Guadalupe River, raced go carts, para sailed, jumped off the roof of the house into the pool, rode 4 wheelers all over the farm, shot a deer, snakes, a wild boar and some animal that looks like a deer called a nalgae! They beautifully adorn the walls of my house and his! Suz and I are thrilled! He played basketball, football and ran track at Taylor High School. Football was his favorite but he didn't like cutting his mullet off before two-a-days!!

Upon graduation, it was time to think college. He really didn't know where he wanted to go and I asked him if he'd like to go see some schools and he said, "Oh, mom; I don't care if it's got any trees!" He eventually went to Texas Tech with his best friend, "Duke", a chocolate lab, and graduated later on with a degree in advertising. Bill and I also gave Suzanne a degree in advertising because we figure she had as many hours in his degree as he did!! Thank you, Suz!

Dave met Suz at a New Year's eve party his senior year in high school. He came in that night and said, "Mom, can I go to early church so I can meet Suzanne at the hotel?" I said, "Who is Suzanne and why are you meeting her at a hotel?!" It was all legit; she was in town with her family for her sister's wedding. Until now, remember, he could have cared less!! Suddenly, he cared!! They dated for 7 years, on and off, and were married July 10, 1999. She is the best thing that has ever happened to him!! He now is the wild father of 2 wild boys, Jackson and Charlie, and one sweet little girl, Camryn. He works with Bill now in construction and has to remodel churches a lot and help run an antique store! I told him I never thought he would be in "church work" or antiques!! He is a sweet, wonderful son, husband and daddy and I thank God every day that he is mine!! His life has been wild and fun and has kept me closer to God than I could have ever imagined!! Happy Birthday Dave - I love you!!