Grateful

Last night, I had the most horrible and vivid nightmare.

Before going to bed, I gave Lucy her customary bedtime bath and pulled a comb through her wispy brown curls. And, guess what? Horror of all horrors, I started combing (you guessed it) those dreaded little bugs off of her perfect little head. I did not burst into tears, though I felt like it. Instead, I screeched for Chad and set to work combing them out. I did not scream. I did not throw anything. But I felt an uncharacteristic despair fill me. I mean, really? Really? I had just started sleeping without imagining bugs crawling all over me and all of my babies. I had finally stopped my psychosomatic scratching. My laundry machine was just now beginning to look me in the eye again. And yet, here we go again.

So I started into the all too familiar routine. The laundry. The hair by hair head checking. The vacuuming. Luckily, all of the other ducks look clean.

When I finally collapsed into my bed last night, smelling once again of that pleasant combination of dog shampoo and bug spray, I couldn't get to sleep. I considered reading. I considered heading downstairs with garbage bags and bleach water. I prayed. And, at last, I slept.

I woke up gasping!!

I had dreamed that my family had discovered that we could communicate with monkeys in the jungle (wait, that isn't the terrifying part--though if there are any theories on this random sequence of events I am all ears). I was trying to understand what a certain series of clicks and hisses was meaning to a family of intelligent what looked to be chimpanzees (though I'm not particularly astute at monkey genus identification) gazing down at us from some trees. The unfortunate part was that we were standing at the curve of a highway as we looked.

I happened to look a slight distance up the road to see that my dad had turned his back to Claire who began wandering onto the road, just as a little red car sped around the corner. What happened next still makes me cringe. I watched as that car clipped my tiny little princess and knocked her into the air and onto the concrete with a resounding "THWUMP". Chad and I stood side by side in mute horror. The last thing I remember was staring at the bottom of her little feet while she lay unconscious on the highway. Somebody was screeching "call 911" and I was trying to gather the courage to approach her. I cringe just to write it.

I woke sobbing with a singular prayer on my lips. Thank you. Thank you for the creepy inconvenience of the lice. Thank you for the healthy, beautiful (albeit slightly infested) heads of every one of my perfect little ducks. Thank you.

And I promise not to attempt communication with any seemingly intelligent monkeys, on the side of a highway or otherwise, anytime soon. Just in case.