The post mortem

It's 1:57 am. I'm so tired. It's been a rough week for sleeping. I need hope in a dark world right now. I'm lying awake in my room and I hear my son cry. That sound is usually followed by a sense of anxiety or frustration. I know all he wants is his way. But I'm already awake. And I'm lonely and scared and Terrance is out of town so I go to him. I ask him what's wrong and his raspy, half asleep voice explains that a giant spider was just in his bed. I remind myself to take down the Halloween decorations and to stop screaming when I see spiders in the house.  I gather him in my arms and hold him. I need something good in my life. "Wanna snuggle yah bed" he begs. I let him sleep with me. I look at him as he drifts to sleep. He flops over and nuzzles his head into the crook of my arm. I lean down and kiss his head and the smell of his childhood innocence is intoxicating and tears well up in my eyes. I need his innocence again. I need the hope back. And then the responsibility I feel to raise him to be a good person weighs on me so much I almost suffocate under it. And then he sighs a contented sigh and I squeeze him a bit and let my face fall into his hair and that smell is there and I finally drift off. He's my hope. I need to sleep so I can get up tomorrow and raise him to be the kind of person that wants to tear down walls, not build them.