Transitions

The orange hand approaches the forty-minute mark, and the green hand peeks out from behind it. In fifteen minutes, the first school bell of the morning will ring half a mile away.

But you are still wearing your favorite flower PJs, and your outer space comforter blankets you in planets and stars. 

I hold my toothbrush in one hand and urgency in the other, my mumbles and gestures at the closet becoming increasingly more exaggerated. 

“But I’m cold,” you say.

I roll my eyes. 

This need to rush, this sense to go, go, go grows inside me. It is rolling down the hallway like a boulder. But you have never seen Indiana Jones, and approaching deadlines are as foreign to you as the idea that you could be crushed by a giant rock.  

My insistent prodding is nothing to you but a distraction. In your four-year-old mind, your layers of comfort shall not be removed, and the school bell shall not ring today. These are your desires, so they must be true. 

And why should you have to leave your bed? Why should you face this transition from the dark, comforting warmth to the cold, hard light? 

Let me tell you, and I promise, later, you can show me the importance of slowing down and appreciating the small pleasures of doing exactly what you want exactly when it matters.

You can show me how that boulder is nothing but a feather.

But right now, my sweet girl, let me coax you through this transition. Because life is a series of transitions – from womb to crib to classroom – and I am here to help you along the way.

So please, get out of bed and put on your damn clothes.