As we have small children, I was sleeping and then suddenly was not.
Judah, 3 almost 4, used the sideboard of our bed early this morning as a step stool to climb over me. I sleep at the edge so I’m a first line of defense for my wife who takes her sleep seriously. But I’m also just an obstacle, like something at Pump It Up. Judah’s only 30 odd pounds so it’s not unpleasant to have him get to the top of me and then roll over. If he had a little more meat on him and deep tissue skills…
“Are you up, dad?”
“No, bud,” I whispered. “Mommy and daddy are still sleeping.”
“Am I up, dad?”
“Yes, bud. It would seem you are up. Shhhh. Sleepytime.”
Judah was quiet. Maybe it lasted only a minute, but it was the perfect and precise amount of time for Pam and I to consider that perhaps the morning assault was over and that he might just doze off.
But then Judah farted. It was a college level fart, specifically the kind of thing found in a dorm room after taco night, usually while one roommate is hunkered down at a desk studying and the other passes by.
“DUDE!”
If Judah’s fart were a cartoon, it would have been a cloud of green dust lifting off his backside with the circumference of a large beach ball. It was a solid effort.
Pam laughed.
“Did I fart, dad?”
“Yes, bud. I think so. What do you say?”
“Excuse me.” And then with near perfect timing/innocence he added, “Can you smell it?”
It wasn’t so much a request as it was an interest in the range.
Now Pam laughed so hard the bed shook.
“Are you laughing, mom? Are you crying?”
I suspect it was a combination of both.
Anyway, time to get up.