New Year’s Day

Last year on this day, I wrote this totally entertaining description of our lovely time at the shore with our perfectly adorable and bestest friends in the whole world who had invited us to dig razor-clams over the New Year holiday.  This year, I have no such tale to tell.  We’re home.  And in fact, the boys aren’t here at all–they’ve all gone to play with friends, so they are making noise in someone else’s house.  Which is awesome, if you ask me. 

My daughter woke up at 6:40 a.m. for no apparent reason.  I rocked her for a few minutes, intending to return her to bed, but she asked in a sweet little voice, “Can I sleep in your bed?  I will not wake you up.” and I answered with some relief and utter fatigue, “Sure.”  She snuggled next to my back for about five minutes, then whispered, “I’m hungry.”

And her day began with a crunchy granola bar and television while I returned to bed for sporadic stretches of sleep until 9 a.m.  Predictably, she was crabby midway through the day and fell apart entirely when her adored brother left her to go play with his friend.  She couldn’t stop crying, so I persuaded her to lay down and watch Spongebob.  A while later, she drifted into my room where I was perusing my bookshelves, weeding out books I’ve already read and preparing a stack to give away on this very blog.  She sprawled out on the floor, right where I’d been standing, and fell asleep with her face tucked neatly under the bed. 

In the subsequent quiet, my husband said (from the comfort of the bed where he was watching football), “So this is how it will be when the kids are gone, huh?” and I said, “Yes, except you’ll be asking me every fifteen minutes what we’re having to eat.”  And he said, “What are we having to eat?” and I . . . well, I can’t tell you exactly what gesture I made, but those of you with impure minds can guess.

(We’re having leftover lasagna, which he won’t eat because of its heavy cheese content.  I’m having salad.  I guess he’ll starve to death.)

The stillness in the house is broken only by the tick-tocking of the kitchen clock and the phantom sounds of the Nintendo Wii bowling game which seems to play itself in the absence of children.  I hear the faint rumble of a football game on the television upstairs and the reedy hum of an airplane flying above the dark grey clouds outside.  And the heat just clicked on.

I could get used to an empty nest.

(Don’t tell the kids.)