March 17, 2014
Dear Hillary…
…it was laundry time, and because you were a little under-the-weather emotionally—you wanted to be right next to me; needed a little “Daddy time”—you were sitting on my lap as I pulled clothes from the bin and threw them into our front-load washer. I two-armed a particularly large batch of items, and as I tossed them into the washing machine you started howling. You were off my lap and head first into the washer before I could react. Over the shoulder you threw item after item, digging deep into the pile of stinkables waiting to be cleaned.
I sat back and waited to see where this was all going, when finally you emerged from the basin triumphant: in each hand was a pair of Mommy’s underwear.
Victory!
You began to coo happily, and wandered off waving them in the air like pom-poms: Go Team Go! Your fascination was so strong I had to wonder if you are a reincarnated Japanese businessman.
As I returned to the task at hand, re-loading the washing machine, you wandered back, smiling. I looked up and you had thrown one pair of Mommy’s underpants over your shoulder and around your neck; you were wearing it like a sash.
Miss America, dirty-underwear contestant.
It was too much for me to bear, so I took a picture and quickly posted it online for all the world to see. Because who wouldn’t want to share an image like that with everyone?
(Mommy, for the record, is the answer to that question. She wouldn’t want to share an image like that with everyone, and was less than pleased with my decision to do otherwise.)
After that, we went to the living room, and for reasons unknown to me you decided to pluck the pacifier out of your mouth, and pop it into mine. I smiled and scrunched up my face in a silly manner as you did so, which made you giggle. Which means you repeated the process. Over and over, you plucked the pacifier (now from my mouth) and then shoved it back in there. And each time I scrunched my face up, and you giggled.
At some point, maybe after three minutes of this nonsense, the thought very clearly crossed my mind: “I never thought I’d be sitting on a floor, having a toddler shoving a pacifier into my mouth, and loving it.”
But I do.
You keep me forever smiling in your direction.
Love,
Dad
.