Those Little Moments of Tenderness
My husband has a standing affair with my daughter every night about midnight. It's the first time she wakes after bedtime, and well, he won't give up that chance to run in, pick her up, kiss her, cuddle, and otherwise wake her from a bleary-eyed sleep for nothing.
In my head, I want to scold him about his "habit" of waking her up. It's brutal that he gets the fun time and then I spend the following hour getting her back to sleep. I want to tell him how unconventional this is--and when she is two-years-old we are totally gonna pay for this lack of schedule (or should I say schedule) in the middle of the night. But then I see the two of them together. The wide adoring smiles (from both). The giggles. The waving arms of joy (again, from both of them). And I remember why I married my husband. And why I chose to have children. For those very instant moments of pure love and joy.
I can't ruin the fun. The husband works hard. Too hard really when you look at the 12 hours a day (sometimes more) he's wrestling with work. And for The Peanut who screams in something that can only be called delight when he arrives back home? This is the child, who if going to bed early, will WAKE UP at the sound of her Daddy's voice. That is something that I refuse to mess with. Not only would I resent myself for taking that delight away from her--well, I think I'd kill just a little bit of my husband's heart in the process. And I can't have that weighing on my shoulders forever. Especially when I can sit back and watch these moments of tenderness, love, and fun between daughter and father. They'll only be there for so long and then disappear into something else.
In my head, I want to scold him about his "habit" of waking her up. It's brutal that he gets the fun time and then I spend the following hour getting her back to sleep. I want to tell him how unconventional this is--and when she is two-years-old we are totally gonna pay for this lack of schedule (or should I say schedule) in the middle of the night. But then I see the two of them together. The wide adoring smiles (from both). The giggles. The waving arms of joy (again, from both of them). And I remember why I married my husband. And why I chose to have children. For those very instant moments of pure love and joy.
I can't ruin the fun. The husband works hard. Too hard really when you look at the 12 hours a day (sometimes more) he's wrestling with work. And for The Peanut who screams in something that can only be called delight when he arrives back home? This is the child, who if going to bed early, will WAKE UP at the sound of her Daddy's voice. That is something that I refuse to mess with. Not only would I resent myself for taking that delight away from her--well, I think I'd kill just a little bit of my husband's heart in the process. And I can't have that weighing on my shoulders forever. Especially when I can sit back and watch these moments of tenderness, love, and fun between daughter and father. They'll only be there for so long and then disappear into something else.
Labels: baby, family, The Husband, The Peanut
