Eden had to spend part of naptime in the hallway because she was waking up Alden. I asked her to say back to me what she had been doing that got her in trouble.
When Alden is laying down, and I stand on his back, and I don’t jump on him, then that still makes him sad. And if I stand on his back and I jump on him, then that makes him sad also.
Elisa and I bought a playpen yesterday. It cost us $20,000. We thought we were buying a Toyota Sienna minivan. But the kids decided on their own that it was meant to be their playpen. Eden will ask, “Can you trap me in the new white car again?” They spent about a half hour in it yesterday and another half hour today. Alden stands in the driver’s seat so he can reach the wheel. Eden plays with the automatic doors a lot.
I had the worst nightmare at Lake Powell. At about 1:30 am, Eden fell out of her bunk. We heard the thump and then the crying. I think that startled Alden awake, and so he was crying. I jumped out of bed. I was on my feet, but that’s when I was having the nightmare. I thought that something terrible had happened to Alden. It looked like something in his crib had fatally injured him. I pulled him out and held him. Up close, I couldn’t see anything wrong with his body, but I was still sure that there was a big problem. Elisa saw how scared I was, and she was saying, “Don’t, Don’t.” That made me more scared. I sat there holding Alden until I calmed down. My skin was stretched tight enough around my forehead that just remembering that sensation was enough to send my heart racing again a few days later.
Elisa and I moved to houseboat’s main room. Half an hour later, I tried to walk back towards the crib again, but just getting near it made all my hair stand on end. Being in the same room provoked a physical reaction that I still couldn’t control. The room was filled with a palpable personality, saying, “Here Be Nightmares.”
Elisa and I talked for a little while about how grateful we are that our kids are alive and healthy. I cried, and that doesn’t happen often. If something happened to my family, I know it would upend my world.