MEMOIR | HUMOR
The Nap Time Compromise
Nap time is never easy
When you’re a four-year-old, nap time is rarely a simple undertaking. In fact, I’m not sure I’ve ever met a child who welcomes nap time.
When I was in kindergarten, there was an allocated time for naps each day. But as kindergarteners, our resistance was valiant. By week 3 of school, Mrs. Lanson accepted defeat and decided to do away with nap time entirely. Soothing to sleep a classroom full of rambunctious five and six-year-olds was surely no easy task.
But if she could manage to monitor 20 children at once — even if she couldn’t get them to sleep — surely I can muster preparing one four-year for nap time, right?
I’ve managed to get Charlie to sleep before, after all. But as months have ticked by and he’s grown tall enough to reach his own door handle, nap time has grown into a more trying endeavor.
After 2 stories, 3 attempted escapes, and Charlie’s 15th battery of laughter following his 20th poop joke, he begins verging close to something that almost resembles sleepy. Almost. Unfortunately, Charlie still has another trick up his sleeve.
“Okay, so how about… when you count to 60, I’m done my nap,” he propositions me.
