I was driving around at noon, running errands, when I calculated that this is how many hours we see Ava each weekday. It’s just not enough. I try to convince myself that all Ava would be doing, were we together all day, would be watching Ruby and Max or coloring by herself at her table, but that’s a cop out, of course. I think about all the stuff we’d have to give up to have one of us stay home all day with Ava, and it’d be Leah and I taking the real hit, not Ava. She’s still fairly unaware of all the trappings of our lives.
This is how kids grow up so fast, when we only see them for 20 hours out of a week that has 80 waking hours. That’s 25%. It explains why I’m sometimes surprised by some new development or another in Ava’s life when we pick her up from preschool.
To be fair, my dad was home with my brother and me when we were kids, which Leah would be the first to point out was not necessarily a fruitful developmental period in my life. But they were good days. We had Big Wheels(TM), our bikes, and dirt to play in; if life did indeed offer more, what was the use in it? I do wish I could give Ava that life. More of my life.