It’s 3:45 in the morning, and I can’t sleep. Neither can Sasha—we’re both jetlagged after a remarkably smooth 14-hour flight home from Taipei. (She slept!)
Which means it’s playtime! Sasha’s brought home a singing green caterpillar (a gift from her cousin), and she happily stomps on it, producing musical bleeps and blurps while I sip the first good cup of coffee I’ve had in two weeks. At one point, Sasha points at me and says, “Baba!” That’s me—Baba. How nice.
But that’s not what brings me to the point of lachrymosity. It’s a few minutes later, when I’m trying to read this week’s New York Magazine. Sasha climbs up on the couch, crawls onto my lap and, in reaching up to defile the publication (as is her weekly routine), she grabs my shirt and gives me… a purple nurple! A painful one, too. Ow ow ow! She giggles through her pacifier, a big dimple-making smile. Thanks, kid.
I don’t actually cry, though. (If I did, we’d have to change the name of this feature.) A childhood familiarity with bullies taught me to tough that shit out.
But then, minutes later, Sasha’s crawling back across the couch to reach some toy when she falls backwards onto the floor, bonking her head (a daily routine, alas). Tears! I pick her up, comfort her as best I can, and then lie down on the couch, kid clinging to my chest, and there’s one of those rare moments when she relaxes and just rests there.
Of course, I’m wired on caffeine, so no relaxing for me! Every couple of minutes, I check to make sure she’s still unconcussed and alive. She is.