Are You Sleeping.

We listen to lullabies.

Both Lily and Blaise had music while they slept: Blaise had guitar, Lily, more contemporary stuff. She started with Kanga and Roo (I want Kanga!).

I never indulged  Ashton with embellished sleep routines. I was tired before he was born. After he was born, I lost my mind, basically, for about two years. I was very, very tired. Our routine was unspoken, but it was there.

I simply held him. There was no singing or back-scratching. I, the ever-loving reader, didn’t even keep to that 20 books per day rule I’d had for the other kids. I was tired. For this child and me, it’s been a matter of survival. No frivolity.

Last night, which is really this morning, I listened to the fish channel. It’s the hospital channel which plays the same five lullabies ad nauseam while simultaneously supplying a fake fish tank on screen. Ashton loves it but it makes me cry. It plays Kumbuya, for God’s sake.  Who doesn’t cry when they hear THAT? And Frère Jacques. That one kills me. Because, no. I am not sleeping. I am watching someone else sleep.

I’m the dream catcher of my son’s cancer.