Boo!

Before I had a child there were certain recurring daydreams I would have. Some were big, like Christmas mornings or our family days. Others (and in some ways, more treasured) daydreams were more mundane, like reading my son a book while rocking him to sleep or taking him outside to play in the snow.

A major recurring daydream would come to me in the mornings as I was getting ready for work. At those moments, with the day not yet cluttered with meddling volunteer editors and meetings of various degrees of frustration, I would style my hair and apply my makeup quietly (a daydream of mine now) while imagining my little son running happily up and down our hallway, fresh with sleep and excitement for the day. I would imagine taking a minute to peek around the bathroom door to watch him dart in and out of the rooms, dragging some blanket behind him. I'd imagine him bringing some toy cars into the bathroom, vrooming them around my bare feet as I good-naturedly swatted them away.

I'd think of this nearly every morning. Long after my darling Little Bug came home and it became obvious that the hallway running wasn't happening right away. I knew it would happen someday.

And then I stopped daydreaming about it. Probably because all my brain power in the mornings is now focused on whether I can shower and dry my hair before Little Bug enters Threat Level Midnight and starts flushing things down the toilet.

But the last few days Appa has been home from travel, allowing me to blow dry my hair on consecutive days (gasp), and I've started noticing something.

Little Bug, running up and down our hall while his laughter echos into the bathroom. Little Bug, peeking around the corner of the door and yelling "BOO" before dissolving into fits of giggles. Little Bug, his hands full of ahzuhs and pillow (a new but beloved friend), along with a couple "choo choo trains," shuffling around my feet as I try to apply my makeup.

To be sure, it's a slight pain when I'm rushing to get ready and he keeps stealing my perfume out of my door or is using his toothbrush as a broom. But it's also one of those moments that I always dreamed about finally coming true. And when I realized that this morning, everything seemed fairly near perfect.