By Dawn’s Early Light

~ Laura

As sunrise comes earlier and earlier every morning, so too come my kids into my bedroom and into my bed earlier and earlier every morning.

Ian was up at 5:30 this morning with Jonah right behind him. (I should be in bed now, but I got sucked into watching the Shawshank Redemption for the 100th time.)

With that early rising, Ian was a goner by late afternoon. He fell asleep on the floor at 5:45, which as any parent will tell you is a really bad thing. If he wakes up after an hour or two, then you have no chance of getting him to bed before 11:00. If he stays asleep, he could either wet the bed in the middle of the night or wake up for good at around 4:00. Nothing good.

So, I tried to wake him up. I put the radio on loudly. I shouted “Wake up, Ian.” I tickled his toes. I even bounced him on my knee with his head waving about, but his eyes stayed close.

Then I gave up and let his warm, heavy body rest upon mine. I brushed his hair off his forehead. Still such a baby. We sat there for a long time thinking about how few days I have left of sleeping babies on my shoulder.

Published by Laura

3 thoughts on “By Dawn’s Early Light”

  1. Didya see Dooce’s solution?
    We spent a year in Surrey, just south of London, when #2-Son (the autistic) was turning one. I had a lot of fun trying to explain to a El-Lay-born, autistic, 11-month-old that even though yes, the sun was waking up, it really wasn’t his wake-up time yet and Mum would really appreciate it if he’d go back to sleep or even just lay quietly until, oh, say FIVE A.M.
    BTW, for the less-than-geographically-inclined, London is on the same latitude as Bangor, Maine. I was infinitely glad we hadn’t moved to Edinburgh!

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  2. Lest you think that the child was not a good sleeper…
    He slept through the Northridge earthquake when we moved back to El-Lay six months later. And looked at us like we were idiots when we got him out of bed to evacuate the business-temporary apartment we were in while waiting for our house sale to close.

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  3. Didya see Dooce’s solution?
    We spent a year in Surrey, just south of London, when #2-Son (the autistic) was turning one. I had a lot of fun trying to explain to a El-Lay-born, autistic, 11-month-old that even though yes, the sun was waking up, it really wasn’t his wake-up time yet and Mum would really appreciate it if he’d go back to sleep or even just lay quietly until, oh, say FIVE A.M.
    BTW, for the less-than-geographically-inclined, London is on the same latitude as Bangor, Maine. I was infinitely glad we hadn’t moved to Edinburgh!

    Like

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