The reading of the second book is always the most challenging.
I sit next to my two-year-old son and force my eyes wide while reading that riveting thriller — One Fish, Two Fish, Red Fish, Blue Fish.
“From there to here, from here to there, funny things are everywhere.”
Ain’t that the truth?
And then I fall sound asleep on the floor while my son sleeps in the bed behind me.
After awhile, I startle awake and begin the crawl out of the bedroom. So quiet. Each knee and hand gently moving forward. One bump — disaster. One bump and the child my wife’s mom warned would be her penance for her teenage years will wake up.
Arggggggggg . . .
Dad????
“And some are very very bad. Why are they sad and glad and bad? I do not know. Go ask your dad.”
Seriously? A grown man? Crawling on his knees?
Night after night this ritual played its course.
Then the second and third kid came along. One on the bed and two on either side. I no longer fell sound asleep by the second book, but would usually last until book number three. But now the books took emotionally dark twists.
“At one time most of my friends could hear the bell, but as years passed, it fell silent for all of them. Even Sarah found one Christmas that she could no longer hear its sweet sound. Though I’ve grown old, the bell still rings for me as it does for all who truly believe.”
Devastation.
That last sentence of The Polar Express came out in gasps as I tried to hold onto the words.
I couldn’t.
My kids looked at me slightly perplexed . . . and demanded the next book.
Sniffling quietly and briefly composing myself, I started Love You Forever:
“I’ll love you forever. I’ll like you for always. As long as I’m living my baby you’ll be.”
Heaven help me. Tears run down my cheeks as the mother goes from young to old and the words of love pass from mother to son. A Lion King circle-of-life moment, sure enough. The sentences become blurry. I can’t continue.
My children fall sound asleep without a care in the world. I, on the other hand, am staring at the wall wondering why I shouldn’t just eat a tub of ice cream and watch Notting Hill one more time.
And now, many years later my wife reads to our granddaughter as we babysit. I listen at a safe distance.
Stories of making tamales and the vagaries of friendship and the joy of wild beasts. Each is better than the last. I am enraptured.
But then bedtime rolls around. No mom and dad present. The instructions left for grandma and grandpa appears to be the procedure for a nuclear bomb launch.
- The baby undresses and throws you her soggy diaper;
- Do bath;
- Wrap her in llama towel;
- Put on lotions, otherwise known as “toppings;”
- Put on night-time diaper;
- Put on pajamas;
- Take her to bedroom;
- Provide a cup of warm milk;
- Provide a bowl of strawberries and dried mango strips;
- Read two books;
- Brush teeth;
- Put her in sleep sack;
- Read two more books;
- Have her turn on the noise machine and humidifier;
- Turn off lights;
- Sing a song;
- Put her into bed.
- Go to local bar.
This is not made up (okay, except for the last one). And I begin to wonder how these kids with these amazing bedtime routines will survive in a world that might not be so caring? You know, a world struggling with climate change and income inequality and racism and sexism and domestic terrorists and guns. Oh, yes, and a pandemic.
It just doesn’t seem to be a world that honors ANY steps in a bedtime routine.
Then I see a book on my granddaughter’s shelf. My old favorite: The Polar Express!
“Though I’ve grown old, the bell still rings for me as it does for all who truly believe.”
Perhaps in this time of vaccines and free Krispy Kremes, it’s time to believe in the future? Time to look forward? Time to breathe?
Why not?
Then my granddaughter, beginning at step “1,” throws her soggy diaper at me.
Joe
Although the grandparent thing has not yet come to pass I do remember the days of sitting on the floor reading books to the kids in their beds and unlike you many nights I fell asleep on the floor only to wake up several hours later stiff, sore and hobbling off to my own bed. I especially remember trying to skip a few lines of each page thinking the kids wouldn’t notice since they couldn’t yet read…only to hear groans & moans when they yelled Dad! That’s not how it goes… read all the words…
Well, Joe – this has to rank up there with all time bests by Joe. I watched the PBS series on Hemingway and how he changed writing forever and felt a twinge of recognition when I read the line – Time to breathe. I tuned in to closing arguments of the Chauvin trial yesterday. having purposely avoided it so far. I couldn’t breathe. Put on my mask to go to yoga at the Y for the first time in over a year. I couldn’t breathe. How lucky your granddaughter is to have loving parents and grandparents who bathe her and lather on the lotion and sing to her and read to her, hopefully giving her the resilience to deal with the unknowns we know she will encounter. Thanks for making my day. Kaye
Nicely done, Grandpa.
Ah, children’s literature, always with that unexpected stab in the heart as one innocently reads aloud to a child. Both of my children (10 years a part) somehow learned to sit quietly staring at the book, purposely not giving me eye contact, until my throat could unfreeze as I tried to get through the sad parts. You know, like in Old Yeller. Or Peter Pan. Or The Wind in the Willows…..
Love this. Yesterday was the first time in over a year that our acquired (adopted) 4 and 2 year old grandchildren were in our house. Books were read, coloring was done, Legos were played with and musical stuffed animal was delighted in. Hope for the future.
I loved this post! My compliments!
Oh my! “Love you forever” made me catch my breath. I remember crying so hard the first time I hear that book read to a convention-room full of fellow nurses and other medical professionals. Just took the wind right out of me. So of course I had to purchase three: one for me and one each for my (grown) daughter and son. Really tugs at the heart.
p.s. Hang in there. I’ve grown quite fond of your essays.
Oh Joe, halfway through I fell asleep only to wake at the sound of my laptop hitting the floor. Read to me some more.
Based on my own (limited) parental experience, the elaborate ritual for the first kid is followed by a stripped-down, bare-bones version for the second (if only because it is not physically possible for the parents to squeeze in double the number of steps). We always make it through the book reading, but the overall bedtime routine regularly tempts us to turn in for the night at 8 pm. Thanks for the great images and good luck with future bedtimes!