The Pounding of My Little Heart...

You wouldn't think that a little girl's pounding heart could make my own nearly burst but it could.

Tonight after her Dad put her to sleep with a countless number of books that included, in order, Peter Pan and Wendy... Where the Wild Things Are... How to Catch a Heffalump... and assorted poems and stories from Where the Sidewalk Ends, a soundly sleeping little bundle of hugs and hope fell asleep peacefully. She woke almost exactly an hour later in a sweat, trembling from a dream, her little heart absolutely pounding from beneath her ribs. I could feel it distinctly with my hand as it rested on her heaving chest. I felt as though it might burst from her pajamas at any time. She cried and cried about the picture she had drawn that was bad, and scary, and how she couldn't find her Daddy to help. I talked to her, reassured her, and then rocked her back to sleep, but I won't quickly forget that fast beating heart, and the way it felt under my hand.

Sometimes this Daddy business is hard.