bright & early

In the top photo is a new furniture addition to the household: Schuyler's stool. As I wrote that last line, I realised how mundane our lives must seem to the untrained eye. I certainly never pined for the day when the highlight of my home life would be an addition to our stool collection. But there you have it. This is an important stool. You see Schuyler had taken to sitting at the counter on the frighteningly unstable bar stools and had tumbled to the unforgiving tiled floor below on many an occasion. She was intransigent. She would not return to her high chair but yet she would not let Charlie sit there either. And her Mum and Dad are not about to go buy another high chair. But a stool? Sure, we'll buy a stool. So we took Schuyler and guided her through the stool selection to the one we wanted. The one with the back. The one with the wide leg span that couldn't be toppled by an obese drunk at four a.m. (the only suitable stand in for a toddler on a fructose high). And now Charlie gets to sit in the high chair relatively undisturbed and Schuyler sits at the counter on her big girl stool. So there you have it. Our lives are really that interesting. All of this masks the wonder of the moments in between all the required chores that glue this life together. People who are in love seem pretty boring. You watch them talk in silly voices to one another and make silly faces. They enjoy even the most insipid activities because they enjoy them together. They don't do anything. They just sit there and enjoy each other. Nobody told me I'd fall in love with my kids as well and that through all the necessary unpleasantries of the day-to-day grind, I'd see a glimpse of something larger than all of us when I hung out with them.

I tried to give Schuyler a high five. She put up her index finger to mine and cried "No, Daddy! High ONE!" That's my girl.