tough times

Poor Coco. Yesterday the girls stayed home, sick. Coco tried to talk his way into staying home, too, or at least into coming home early, but I'm a little more experienced as a parent and it's too early in the year for me to say "*&%! it, let's go kite flying instead."

It was tough going, though. He refused to hold my hand the whole way. One of the regular benefits of the stay-at-home world is that, in ten years now, not a single day has passed when I haven't held a smaller hand in mine. (It's only a downside on really hot, sweaty days.)

But after school he held my hand later and apologized for the morning and told me that he almost cried at school because he missed me. He didn't, though, don't get the wrong idea. Apparently, he rubbed his eyes and sniffed and it went away.

Then, this morning, after we had our goodbye smoochie and I turned around, I was hug-tackled around my thighs and there he was again, with his eyes a little redder and bulgier than usual. I bucked up and gave him another hug and off he went. Brave dude.