Why Do?

Frequently when we put Jack down for bed at night, he knows it's time. He lies down flat on his stomach, or lifts his little butt up into the air, closes his eyes, and ultimately sleeps. Sure, there are the occasional delays - Jack babbling contentedly to himself, or liberating his stuffed animals from the crib - but gradually he's silent, asleep.

Then there are nights like tonight, when for whatever reason, he doesn't want to sleep. He runs out into the living room in the middle of story time, he heads for the back stairs or the front window....the other night he ran out to the kitchen and asked for "shirryal?" And on some of those nights when we do put him down in the crib, he cries. Usually this turns into sleep within a minute or two, because he's exhausted, but sometimes he wails loudly, as though betrayed, and we'll go in, and soothe him, and usually he'll see us, too tired to even sit up, and sleep.

Tonight I went in, shortly after Emily had put him down, and gone in herself, because he was still crying. And as I soothed him - he was too tired to even sit up - he said, "Why do? Why do?"

Now we know a lot of what Jack means when he says things, like "Peeez!" is "Please," and "Shirryal" is Cereal, and "Mawk-muh" is milk -- why he's turned a one-syllable word into a much more difficult two-syllable one is beyond us. But "Why do?", I have no idea.

I hope he's not saying "Why do you put me to bed now? I want to read and run and laugh and play more! Let's go run around the backyard with the basketball, or go see the Teddies down the street, or maybe catch a few minutes of The Backyardigans show we have on TiVo. Why do you put me to bed? Why do?" It's probably just me thinking that.

But just in case he is saying that, I'll try to make sure he gets his fill of all those activities -- all of which, I should add, we did repeatedly today -- tomorrow. And the next day, and....