Sweet potato

It was one of those days. My mind kept going to all of the things that are going wrong. Or… maybe not even wrong but not as right as I want them. It kept making lists. Daring itself to find more to heap onto the pile of sad and stress and ugh. The list included things like: the baby is still not sleeping and we don’t have anything to make for dinner tonight. It included a big thing here or there. But a lot of smaller things too.

After the second attempt at the second nap of the day, I gave up. A total of forty minutes in two twenty minute sessions would have to do. I began praying that what appeared to be a sleep disruption would have only positive affects on our chances for nighttime slumber (whether or not it did very much depends on your perspective).

I laid him down on a blanket in the living room, keeping a close eye as I busied myself in the kitchen. I needed to accomplish something. Succeed somehow. I couldn’t make the baby sleep but I could make him some sweet potato. Providing healthy something, somehow.

Eventually I laid down next to him. I started doing this out of exhaustion. And every time I do, he smiles. Seeing my face so close. Both of us doing the same thing at the same time. Equals almost. I smile too.

And there we stayed. Playing and singing side by side.

And the list making in my head slowed.

Later my girl woke up and we walked to the park. Hand-in-hand (except, of course, when we got to the neighbor’s garden wall. Because she can walk along that all by herself). I pushed her on the swings. We swung together, face-to-face. And then we spent a half hour in the sand box. Making towers and islands for princesses and filling cups and buckets and dump trucks. Sand in our shoes and caked onto our hands and it felt good. The sun warmed our backs as we worked and I remembered that it is spring. Finally really and truly.

Other moms sat on benches or stood in circles chatting about this and that as their kids ran about. I used to envy them. But not anymore.

And the list making in my head slowed.

And for the rest of the afternoon, I felt a bit lighter. Less wrong. A little bit more right.

We ordered in for dinner and we ate and happily filled our bellies.

Except for the baby. Turns out, he doesn’t like sweet potato.

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