Picture this, if you please. I’m reading in the corner chair on a peaceful Saturday afternoon. From the kitchen I hear my husband. “Luke, put that down. Luke, that’s for dinner. Luke, let me have that, please. Luke!”
My 1 1/2 year old, clad in a tie-dyed onesie comes tearing into the living room, pumping his plump, naked legs as fast as they can go. Before him he is defending a piece of flat bread as big as my laptop, with a respectable-sized chunk clenched between his teeth and rapidly disappearing into his mouth as he runs. My husband, wiping his hands on a dishcloth, is in hot pursuit.
And me? Am I useful? Protecting a dinner that’s running around the house on borrowed legs? No. I’m laughing so hard that I’ve dropped my book and lost my page, not that I could read it through the tears in my eyes anyway.