Only an Hour

Its 0441 and I’m not very wide awake and working. Well, perhaps I should say I’m at work. To say I’m working would be a bit misleading. The clients are all sleeping and the hospital is quiet and peaceful. It’s night two of three for me.

Before going any further, let me explain something. When I work nights, I sleep during the day. Obviously I cannot have Kevy at home while I’m sleeping, he’s just not old enough to be left to his own devices while I sleep the day away. Rather, he stays at the sitter for the nights, and the days following the nights. For me to work a three night stretch he spends almost 72 hours at the sitter. Its almost physically painful for me to do that, but it has to be done. Thank goodness it only happens twice every six weeks! It could be much worse; I could be working a rotation that was all nights.

Anyhow, on the way to work earlier in the evening, I stopped in at the babysitter’s home, as previously arranged, and spent an hour with Kevy. I opened the door without knocking and I saw a body hurtling in my direction; he launched himself off the stairs and threw himself into my arms and wrapped himself around my neck and my waist. “Gramma! Gramma!” I nearly cried.

We browsed through the Canadian Tire flyer that I had brought in for precisely that purpose. He oohed and aahed over everything and we’ve now decided that we would like to go camping, get a pool, a water trampoline, and buy a black garden tractor, preferably all at the same time. Just the feel of him on my lap and the sweetness of his voice is enough to heal the tiredness from a too-short sleep.

The babysitter fed me supper; ribs and pasta salad. I swear she’s trying to fatten me up so they can eat me. Yesterday she prepared a plate of kjeilke and sipple fat. Yummy! I’ll have to start saying no to her food, but its soooooo good! No wonder Kevy won’t eat my food, its not a quarter as good as hers! And I swear he gains two pounds every time he goes there!

Her daughter and I looked through her scrapbooking supplies and she showed me the cards she is planning to sell at my garage sale. We agreed that a visit to Michael’s (the biggest craft store in the city) was in order for Saturday.

The other daughter showed me the sign she had made and asked me if $0.50 was too much for a glass of lemonade. She’s going to be selling lemondade and cherry lemonade at my garage sale.

I love those girls for all the time they spend with Kevy and all the playing they do with him. The scrapbooking daughter lets Kevy play with her supplies when she is scrapbooking. I’m not sure that I would be trusting enough to do that.

After the hugs, the flyer, the food, and the scrapbooking, my hour was up and it was time to head to work. It was without a doubt the best hour of my day. How my priorities have changed since his arrival!