I’m sick and my body feels sore and somehow my ribs hurt and it’s late but I wanted to write this because in the morning I won’t feel the same and I didn’t want to forget.

But a few nights ago my kid came into my room and he said, “Mama if I get ready by 9 will you sleep with me the whole night?” because usually I’ll wait until he falls asleep and then in the morning he’ll run into my room so I said sure. And he’s been consistent every night so far and I think it’s so cute that he took initiative and made this deal out of nowhere but also I feel sort of sad that he felt like he had to make a deal butttt also if we’re being honest I would have made up some kind of excuse so him doing it this way forces me into at some point having to deny a reasonable long standing contract and that’s going to be a lot harder to justify the longer this continues. Dammit, how did I end up here?

Once in a while he’ll do something and I’ll look at him and realize “Oh you got older somehow, fuck I thought I had more time.” When this first started happening I would cry a lot but I don’t know if I’m used to it now or just that “first amusement park ride alone” and “first formal transactional deal” hit different.

He’s right though. One time I was giving him a bunch of hugs and kisses and I told him I try to get as many as I can now because one day he’s not going to want them anymore and he said that I could do that forever. That’s part of why kids are great, because they still think things like that lol. But I know exactly what’s going to happen so even more so I should spend as much time with him while he still wants to snuggle with his mama.

My friend who is also a founder came to visit us last week and we talked about our kids. I told him our kids get to watch us build something. But balance is hard, right? You’re building but the stakes are crazy high, like if this doesn’t work it’s not a “bummer I gotta move back home” it’s “our entire family is in jeopardy” and at the same time you still have to “raise the stakes” (ha ha), because they’re your kids. That’s why there’s so much burnout, but at the same time, it’s hard not to beat a driver like that.

He’s my first priority, obviously, and then untangling my thesis into digestible pieces is a close second. He has had a very different childhood than I had, and I think that’s really cool. One time he caught me staring at him while he was playing video games and he said, “What are you looking at?” and I said, “I was just wondering what it’s like to be you” and he said, “It’s pretty fun.”

I might not always know what I’m doing, but I’ll always know why.

Times I got schooled by a 5 yo: 1
How many more times I’ll learn something from him: All of them