I often sit in my 5-year-olds’ room at night while she falls asleep. I think about the day.
Being there soothes my kids. That’s my excuse.
But being there soothes me, too.
My daughter wrestles with sleep like it’s a theological dilemma. If there IS sleep – and I’m not saying there is – how can I know that it’s intimately involved in MY life? … and … What’s the meaning of sleep, anyway? … and … Why does bad sleep happen to good people?
I sit in a chair, a hard, perfect rocking chair that belonged to me a long while ago. It’s the kind of sturdy chair that makes people say things like, “They just don’t make things like they used to.” My mom tells stories of reading happily in it when I was younger, both legs flung over an arm. My daughter uses it as a diving platform for jumping across her hot, raging lava floor and onto her bed.
The Chair has been repaired several times throughout the decades of its rich and long life, and one glance at it will tell you that it needs to be again. But I lack the resolve to make the change because I fear that the pursuit of beauty will somehow alter its character or release its soul or dilute its magic. And that will never do.
I sit in the almost dark, and I listen to Darya.
“Mom?” D says in her sturdy voice.
“Yes, Darya?”
“Why does lava bubble up from a volcano?”
“We’ll talk about it in the morning, Darya. It’s sleeping time.”
And a few minutes later…
“Mom?” Darya asks, wide awake.
“Yes, Darya?”
“When people go into outer space, they can’t breathe. That’s why they wear space suits. Right, Mom?”
“We’ll talk about it in the morning, Darya. It’s sleeping time.”
And a few minutes later we do it again.
And a few minutes later we do it again.
And a few minutes later we do it again.
Until I’ve said “Yes, Darya.” and “We’ll talk about it in the morning, Darya. It’s sleeping time.” at least four thousand times.
For a long time, I thought I should stop her at “Mom?”
But every once in a while, she whispers something that tugs at my heart.
“Mom?”
“Yes, Darya?”
“What’s that sound?”
It whistles as it blows. To me, it’s comforting, being warm and cozy inside while a storm rages. I’ve learned that the storm always rages, that it’s ever-present, that it’s part of life. And so I’ve learned to love it when there’s shelter and we’re all curled up together and safe at home. To Darya, though, the wind is a stark reminder that storms exist at all.
“It’s just the wind, baby. It’s just the wind,” I say, which soothes her for reasons I don’t understand.
I don’t want to miss these questions. These thoughts. So even though I tell her that we’ll talk about most things in the morning, I still keep my foot in the conversation door, not closing it on “Mom?”
“Mom?”
“Yes, Darya?”
“Are you going to leave?” She means tonight and as soon as I fall asleep.
And I have to say, “Yes, Darya. I’m going to leave.”
She’s sad. And I think the Chair is sad, too. And I know the mama in the story is sad. Because I am her. And I’m going to leave.
I don’t poo-poo her five-year-old fears at being left by her mama. I don’t tell her that she has a sister whose hand is a room away and ready for holding. I don’t suggest that she should be brave, because courage in the night is never an expectation I have of anyone at all. I don’t remind her that she ends up in my bed still every single night and that our minutes apart from each other will be few and fleeting.
Because I know that it’ll only be a short while – just a matter of the growing-up years – ’til I say, “Darya, are you going to leave?”
And she’ll say, “Yes, Mom. I’m going to leave.”
I pet the arm of my Chair, hand moving with the grain of the smooth wood.
Being there soothes my little girl. That’s my excuse.
But being here soothes me, too.
The Chair knows. I think she really does.
