Jumpy

Gabe has placed a new “startle factor” into my life. I’m normally not that jumpy of a person, but there are times when I believe that all children are snug in their beds, and I’m guzzling some water in the kitchen and I hear a small creak in the dining room and think – ‘Is that…?’ and peer around the door and jump a bit because there is a little person standing there looking at me. Or after we have gone to bed and the house is dark, and above the whir of the fan I hear a noise in the hall and suddenly there is movement over by the piano, as Gabe has sleepily wandered out in search of name-the-item. Makes one a mite jittery if one doesn’t expect such things. I’m just waiting for the day when I am sleeping soundly and suddenly jerk awake to find a small person standing at my bedside waiting for me to wake up.

*****************

This is a conversation I had with Gabriel today; make that monologue he had: “C’oe (Chloé) doesn’t poop on the books (in the bookshelf), she doesn’t poop on the wug (rug) – she’s a bad g’ul (girl) she doesn’t poop on the ceil-din (ceiling) (he cranes his head back and gestures up at the ceiling as he talks) – she – she can’t fy (fly) up dere and…she poops in the fwont (front) yard, she doesn’t poop on da con-keet (concrete) she poops in da fwont yard yeah.” And OK. Any questions?