peevish mama

Ever have one of those mornings when your kids look perceptibly bigger? Like they yawned and stretched and grew in the night? But why? Did they travel to exotic lands in their dreams? Haggle with heathens? Ride magic carpets? Stumble over sand dunes, flushed and breathless? Did they sail over treacherous seas, fending off pirates and sea creatures and ravenous sharks? Did they swing on vines, outrun avalanches, leap over volcanos, their limbs pounding and reaching, strong and long? Or did they sleep the sleep of mummies, of poisoned beauties – immobile, deep and impossibly dark? Footie pajamas are so telling. One minute they’re baggy. The next – taut at a drum. They must grow every night. Every hour. Every minute. But some nights, I swear, they grow more.