Sharma sleeps on

Sharma sleeps on the ottoman under the desk in the dining room. Her favorite place to be since our second kid came along. A purple mouse-toy clumped with cat hair looks almost gray as it pokes out from under her fat rump and stupidly eyes the Georgian green wall. Torn envelopes and statements sticking up at all angles from the mini mail sorter. Constant on-and-off again beeps from the construction work across the street. Rumble of dirty yellow machines moving dirt around. Toy plates and baby-doll paraphernalia across the floor. But Vaughn is upstairs in her room building a Lego tower shaped like a bird, and Dash is conked out in his crib, lullabied to sleep perhaps by the whispering water of KC's shower. Alone in the back room with my mug of black tea staring stupidly with half-awake eyes into the harsh light of the monitor screen bearing the news of a massive Fisher-Price toy recall, unacceptable levels of lead paint found again in toys made in China. Makes me wonder why we have so many toys, especially when Vaughn's favorites, often enough, are Birdhand and Duckhand, which would be my right hand and my left hand. I suppose we have so many toys (it's not so many really) because our families love them, and holidays are capitalist events, and most importantly grownup hands get tired.