This IS the Life

It seems my feet have gone numb again. I'm faintly aware of having them, as I scoot my body into bed once again. As nimbly as I can, I push not only my weight, but the twenty pounds of baby who has only recently fallen asleep on my chest, back on my pillow. I lay there for awhile, assessing the situation of my tingling toes, amused at the irony of them falling asleep while doing hard labor. I spent the last twenty minutes rocking, pacing, toe-standing, half-squating, poorly singing, figuring out how to get this baby to sleep while also squeezing in what might amount to some actual exercise.
Success. He sleeps. So, I scoot onto my pillow and into bed. I make three pathetic semi-bends at the waist to reach my blanket, but realize the futility and so, pull them up contortion style, with my toes.
All of this effort, and these antics, have led to one moment of bliss. A sleeping baby on my chest. A moment that deserves to be treasured. I mentally calculate the weight distribution of his twenty pounds, to my full-grown mother size. Not much; certainly not the crushing, claustrophobic presence of a full grown body. And yet, he is not my body, and so he will lay at my side as he does every night.
The transition. I roll over, slowly, and, ever slowly, I begin the act of placing him beside me. He is immediately alarmed at the change of temperature and perhaps notices the certain amount of softness from my mattress that does not exist in my tangle of neck and collar bone.
He's awake. And so, I'll nurse him till he falls into a bear like slumber, for the night, not hibernation. More like a peaceful two or three hours until the cycle starts again. This is bliss, this is parenthood, this is the life. Good night!