JANET SPAETH: LULLABY
If this is your first child, there is one very important thing you must understand before you go one day further.
You are not in charge!
Not anymore. Maybe you once were, but now you are a parent, which means you have given up control of your pride, your sleep, and your sanity. I’m sorry. Someone had to tell you.
My first lesson came when my daughter was a mere four weeks old. My in-laws were going to watch her while my husband and I went to a wedding.
“She’ll go down for a nap around three o’clock,” I told my in-laws. “The tape is already in the player.”
“Tape?” my mother-in-law asked.
Now, tell me this wasn’t brilliant: every day when it was her naptime, I played the tape—it happened to be Pachelbel’s Canon in D, with loon calls and bird whistles. (What can I say? This was my first child. I had no idea.) I figured that she’d soon associate the music with naptime, and eventually, all I’d have to do was play the music and she’d nod off happily.
My husband and I went to the wedding, and the bride walked down the aisle, slowly, very, very, very slowly, to, yes, Pachelbel’s Canon in D. This was the world’s longest aisle, I’ll tell you. By the time the bride reached the altar, my husband’s eyes were closed, and my head was on his shoulder. We woke up before either of us began snoring, but it was close.
To this day, whenever I hear that piece of music, I start to nod off.
My daughter, however—I swear to you that the girl perks up when the song plays.
And what have we learned from this? That parents are trainable, but children are not. Just accept it. And get some sleep. I have just the thing....
JANET SPAETH is a writer and the mother of two children. Be gentle with her. She’s been sleep deprived ever since the tape player broke.
Titles by Barbara Bretton
SPELLS AND STITCHES
SPUN BY SORCERY
LACED WITH MAGIC
CASTING SPELLS
JUST DESSERTS
JUST LIKE HEAVEN
SOMEONE LIKE YOU
CHANCES ARE
GIRLS OF SUMMER
SHORE LIGHTS
A SOFT PLACE TO FALL
AT LAST
THE DAY WE MET
ONCE AROUND
SLEEPING ALONE
MAYBE THIS TIMES
ONE AND ONLY
Anthologies
THE CHRISTMAS CAT
(with Julie Beard, Jo Beverly, and Lynn Kurland)
Spells & Stitches Page 27