- 5, 5:30, 6. It’s getting harder to get up without the sun, but I’m determined to preserve the silent, still hours that ground and fill me before everyone else’s day begins.
- She wakes up an hour early. I make her a tea “like daddy” and wrestle through the rest of Matthew Henry’s thoughts on Malachi as she plays not as quietly as she promised, rebuking my anger at the intrusion. This time—her presence near me, not the study—is precious.
- Big emotions today.
- She smiles around the very anxiety that angers her as she tells me the story, the trauma still fresh. I offer sympathy and practical suggestions that I know will be received, lacking the boldness to say more.
- Cat nap with the cat.
- We hide together under the blankets for half an hour, then make a fort in the living room to watch Hilda. She wants to snuggle but also doesn’t want me to touch her. Such a grownup feeling.
- Homemade bread you’re not allowed to eat straight from the oven is a special sort of torment.
- Tears spring up as sharp and sudden as if I’d been slapped across the face. But I rally against the rising masochistic voices, dragging each one into the light where it cannot stand all the shadows have dissolved. A fitting prelude to the night’s lesson.
- Reconciliation in the dark.
- I am allowed to have my feelings, but my feelings are not allowed to have me.
