Sleep doesn't come easily to me, so I sit here in near darkness and solitude listening to my young daughter snore gently.  She's tucked into her grown-up sleeping bag, sprawled haphazardly on the carpeted floor of the den, just beneath the plasma tv her Dada just had to have.  She prefers the floor/sleeping bag combo to the bed in the guest room--more adventurous, I'd guess.  We'd had a fairly marvelous day, as much as I can rate such days anymore. 

She joined me at my shop for a couple of hours, where she busied herself in the windowed storage room upstairs that now serves as her semi-private, by invitation only club.  She  played on the computer as she loves the kids' games on Shockwave.  And she shopped for a present for her teacher next door in the connected bookstore.  Picked out a book, something about cats with magical powers, sort of Harry Potter feel to it only with furry felines.  "Dada, my teacher loves cats AND she loves mythology.  Can I buy it for her?"  The book is intended to be her end of the school year present for the teacher, the sort of things parents normally do. . .that Mama insists upon.  Of course, I said yes, impressed that my daughter came up with such a thoughtful gift on her own, all the while knowing her mother would think that wasn't enough.  And Daughter had money of her own, too, and after paying for it, promptly hand made a book mark.

It was Saturday, one of the two or three days a month where we spend all day together then she sleeps over with me.  I love these days.  We left the shop at noon, heading down the mountain to the pool store in order to get a few supplies for her & Mama's pool--a pool I never wanted but always kept up.  Instead of buying a whole new vacuum hose and attachments, I bought replacement parts to save money--not even my money since Mama would reimburse me.  And we blasted back up  the mountain because fishing awaited. . .fishing that my daughter had come to love after trying it for the first time a few weekends earlier.  As we drove, we had the warm, late spring mountain air rushing at us through open windows with the Pirates of the Caribbean soundtrack pounding loudly--we love that music and the movie.  It's ours.

After dropping the supplies off at her house, I saw the hot tub water was green--good thing I picked up extra filters for it, as well, since I knew that was the cause of the nasty-looking water.  Figuring Mama would be back from her office in a couple of hours, I opened the back deck door, attached the hose to the jacuzzi, and began to let it drain.  A part of me wanted to stick around to fix the pool vacuum hose and finish the hot tub task of emptying, cleaning, and refilling, but the fish awaited and Daughter was getting antsy to get some worms.  Tomorrow, I thought, will be soon enough.

Apparently, it wasn't.  "You left the back deck door open?  I'm not going to be there maybe until midnight."  I'll go back and shut it since we just left a few moments ago.  "No.  I'll just take a break in an hour and go back myself.  What about the vacuum hose?"  I got parts to fix it that I'll do tomorrow when I bring Daughter back.  Simple stuff and saved money.  "You didn't do it yet?  Well, I guess I'll do it when I go back for the hot tub then.  Next time, just get the whole package--it would've been easier if you had done that."  Right.  "Did you get the teacher gift while you were out getting the pool stuff?"  She bought a book on her own, made a personal bookmark, and no, because the mall is another 20 minutes beyond the pool place.  You didn't ask me to go there.  "Well, there is nothing in this town that will work.  I looked last week."  Fine, but I didn't know that and she DOES have the book.  "That's not enough.  Fine, I'll find time somehow to do it myself this week.  I'm on call almost every day, though."  I'll see if I can find time to get back to the mall Monday or Tuesday.  "It'd be good if you could since I'm gonna be busy."

Daughter and I finally get to fishing around 4:30 p.m.  The large pond is walking distance from my small rental house and it's a catch-and-release pond for the inhabitants of the subdivision primarily composed of second home owners and reverse snowbird folks who live in the flatlands during the winter.  As usual, we caught and let go dozens of fish over the course of the next two-plus hours--she's good, too.  Baits her own hook, makes her own casts, takes the fish off the hook by herself.  We laugh over the small fish that pee or fart while we're removing the hooks, and coo over the "big" ones that we pull in then toss back out into the pond.  Two smallish bream swallowed the hook too deeply, though, and Daughter wanted to keep them, though keep in this instance was a euphemism for  not seeing them float dead in the pond.

I can cook them up at the house.  "Really?" she asked.  Yep.  When I was your age, I fished a lot, and I remember how to clean them, cook them, and especially how to eat them.  "I don't like fish, but I want to see how you cook them, anyway.  You gotta eat'em, though, Dada."  Good enough.  And so I showed her.  I warned her first that I had to chop off their heads, scoop our their guts, then de-scale them.  "You do?  Ewww.  But, I still want to watch."  And so I did.  She was fascinated, and I'd like to think her young mind found some new reason to appreciate me, that I had mad skills about which she could brag to her friends. 

She had mac-n-cheese, de rigeur for her when staying over.  I egg washed the bream, coated them in corn meal, then fried them in a pan.  She sat beside me, and though she didn't want any fish, she wanted to say a few words over them before I ate.  "Well, fishies, I'm sorry you had to die, but at least you don't go to waste.  Circle of life, I guess.  You die but you give food to Dada.  Amen."  We chuckled and ate. . .she said "try the tails," so I did, and they were crunchy, crisp, and truly flavorful.  While we ate, we watched the DVD of our performance in a ballet we were both in a few weeks ago, a ballet set to the soundtracks of a few movies, most notably (and about 80% from) Pirates of the Caribbean. 

She snuggled in my lap for the entire two-hour show, laughing and critiquing my parts, while noting how she was doing all her steps correctly.  I complimented her performance and showmanship effusively, all the while showering her with the kisses and hugs we share so freely whenever we're together.  And we hummed the Pirates music we know so well until she fell asleep.

So, here I sit in the near darkness and solitude, listening to my daughter's gentle snoring. . .knowing I take her back this afternoon, reduced to seeing her for a couple of hours each day after school when I pick her up or when I join her for lunch.  Sometimes, I want to go back.  I want that old life, the comfortable life I wore like a pair of my favorite jeans.  I want to go back to the house I painted, back to the ceiling fans I installed, back to the kitchen I designed, back to the litter boxes I cleaned, back to the pool I hated but maintained anyway, back to the hot tub that soaked my weary bones after a run or long bike ride, back to my own walk-in closet, back to cooking every meal, back to nurturing Daughter every morning and evening, back to doing all the mundane things Mama has no time for other than oversight, back to the bedroom full of empty excuses.  I long for those times, even as I push them further away.