Expectations Unmet.

I have grand dreams (expectations) of what bedtime should look like. It involves a clean room, decorated in a way that fancies whimsy and happily-ever-after’s. There are my children, freshly bathed (with no arguments having occurred about said activity, in a clean bathtub where they played imaginatively until I forced them out of the now cold water in fear of them becoming a permanent raisin), in perfectly pressed pajamas. My girl in her flower and lace collared night gown and my son in a two pieced striped set. All four of us, them and myself and my husband, gather into and around the bed to read another chapter of whatever glorious and magical classic we happen to be in the middle of. The whole thing is so lovely we practically lose ourselves and the time to the characters and before we know it the children have long since fallen asleep to the sound of our voices. We kiss their soft rosy cheeks, make sure they are securely tucked under their impossibly soft and plush comforters, and tip toe out of the room whispering about how blessed we are.

I want this to be possible. I know some of it is. I know we could be doing more reading and tucking even if the room is a total disaster and I just finished convincing one of them to stop crying because the other called them a baby and they accidentally spit their toothpaste on the counter instead of in the sink and my girls hair is so ratted from the day it gets caught in her shirt as I try to lift it over her head. Not to mention their juice stained lips and smelly “I refuse to wear socks” toes and now it’s too late to think about a bath because Mom wasn’t paying attention to time once she finally sat down and attempted to check out somewhere on the interwebs.

And that’s the real problem isn’t it? The Mom checking out. Needing to check out. Being so consumed with errands and drop offs and pick-ups and lunch packing and dinner making and homework helping and fight refereeing (all on top of whatever job or other personal pursuits of her own), that come time to sit all she has the energy left to do is drown out everything with status updates and strangers Instagram selfies and pseudo news reports from the Huffington Post.

Life robs us of bedtimes. It robs us of the one time in the whole day where our kids are still and might actually HEAR, really HEAR, what we are saying to them. It robs us of the opportunity to lay down next to them and simply breathe in their existence as they drift to sleep. Life makes us too tired to just be present when they are FINALLY tired and I find this to be such a shame. I try not to feel guilty for all of the above, because I do check out and I do want to read mindless updates from people who aren’t actually really even my friends. I want to do it because I see false connection in what is so honestly a disconnect and some days, outside of my husband, that false connection is the only one I have to the outside adult world.

It’s all so terribly complicated and I try not to feel guilty for the quick and easy and disconnected bedtimes I so typically give my children. I pray the same prayer I have prayed over them since they were babies, sometimes with my eyes closed working at genuine focus and other times I am literally pulling a dirty shirt over my kids head and picking toys up off the floor as I recite it.   I tell myself it’s alright, and it isn’t a big deal because I pour into other areas with more ease. Unfortunately for me, I simply don’t believe my own argument. I can’t because I DO disconnect more than I should at ANY given time. I like to say knowing is half the battle, and maybe it is, but it also feels like the easiest part of the battle and until I actually pick up my sword I haven’t done much at all.