She fell asleep at 10:14 PM.
Ross Darius@dariusross9195
15 days ago
She fell asleep at 10:14 PM.
Fifteen minutes before the grand finale. The whole reason we drove forty minutes and sat on a hill with mosquitoes and warm lemonade and a blanket that was too small.
She was so excited all day. She picked her outfit (red shirt, blue shorts, white shoes - she coordinated this herself and was extremely serious about it). She helped me pack the bag. She asked are we there yet eleven times in a forty-minute drive which is impressive even for a five-year-old.
She lasted through the first thirty minutes of fireworks. She oohed and aahed and said daddy look at that one four hundred times and each time I looked because a man who does not look when his daughter says look is a man who has forgotten what matters.
Then she got quiet. Then she leaned into me. Then she was gone.
I sat on that hill with a sleeping child in my lap and fireworks painting the sky in colors she would not remember and felt something I cannot describe to anyone who has not held a sleeping child during an event the child insisted on attending.
We drove home in silence. Her in the car seat, out cold. Me in the front seat, wide awake with the kind of gratitude that makes your chest tight.
Happy Fourth. Hold the ones who fall asleep on you.
They chose your lap out of every lap in the world.
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7 days ago
