1095 hours

I have been meaning to write this post for a while now, but have been holding out waiting for the right prompt. That prompt came this morning after I watched Jane McGonigal on TED. In her talk, she informs the audience that she will add years to their lives in  7 ½ minute increments, then asks: "how will you spend these extra 7 ½ minutes of bonus life?"

 

The answer is clear, spend more time with my family. While I spend all my waking hours with JR, and one would think that I would seek an opportunity to spend time away from her as she is drifting off to sleep, most days I chose to go to sleep with her. Whether it is during nap-time or bed-time, you will find me sitting right there in bed with her, or rather she sitting right there in bed with me. Together we read books, sing songs, and drift off to our dreams. Some days I sleep before her, other days, she does before me, but either way, we sleep together. Sometime during the night, she finds herself in her own bed, only to wobble back to ours, and wakes up in the morning wrapped in the blankets between her dad and I. If I was to do a quick math to determine how much time I could have had by myself if JR was "taught" to put herself to sleep by herself, it would come out to around 1095 hours. That is close to 45 days that I could have had to myself. But instead I chose to spend them with her. Why? Because in the span of a lifetime, 45 days is not that long; one day she won't need me by her side to fall alseep, and that day will come only too soon.