It's 2:03 am. I am
deeply, deeply asleep. Then, somewhere
deep inside me, my conscious mind hears little feet hit the floor above my
head. By the time she reaches my
doorway, that part of my brain is pushing past the dreams snuggled deep in my
comfortable bed and by the time she reaches my side of the bed, I'm able to
comprehend her small frame standing beside me.
"What is it honey?" I mumble.
"I have to go to the bathroom Mama."
"So go", I sigh back at her.
"I can't tuck myself back in."
"Go on up, I'll
be right there." It isn't worth
arguing with her in the middle of the night so she always automatically wins
this fight.
I disentangle myself from the personal heater that is my
sleeping husband and slip out of bed behind her. Upstairs, I slump against the bathroom wall
as she uses the toilet and then send her to her bed while I use it myself. As I climb the steps to her bunkbed, I notice
the shortest member of our family has, as usual, repositioned herself so that
she is on top of all of her blankets with her feet on her pillow, her hands and
knees tucked underneath herself, her rump in the air and her face straight down
into the blankets. A mass of hair covers
the entirety of her head and her quiet snoring indicates that she is, in fact,
able to breathe under there. I step back
down, find an extra blanket that has been used as a picnic blanket for stuffed
animals on the floor and cover her. In
her bed, the taller one sits patiently waiting for me to tuck her back in. After I make sure she's secure under a sheet
and no less than four blankets, I start to whisper-sing "Rainbow
Connection" to her and find that though I estimate that I have sung this
song no less than 2,200 times in her lifetime I suddenly can't remember half
the words. I mumble the missing bits and
she luckily, doesn't notice. Straight
into "La La Lemon" because if I don't sing them both - she WILL notice and I think, 'great - if I can't even remember the words, THIS time I'm tired enough
to go straight back to sleep'.
So here it is, 3:12 am and clearly I was NOT able to go straight back to sleep. I know that the light from my computer and
iPad are supposed to further disrupt my sleep pattern but mindless television
seems to be the only thing that turns off my brain in these occasions. So I write this little story, I'll watch part
of an old episode of The West Wing
and then try again to return to dreamland.
Ah - the beautiful, blessed life of a mother.
1 comment:
That's some pretty good writing for being the middle of the night. Hope the West Wing does it trick.
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