The Witching Hour

For the past three, almost four months, I have secretly rejoiced in Lola's ability to sleep from 8 PM to 5 AM.

However, last night, for the sixth night in a row, Lola woke up at 11 o'clock. Then, at 3 AM. And then again at 4:30 AM. Each time she was up, she was UP. And each time she awoke, so did Archie and Gizmo. And each time she wanted to be fed, they wanted to be fed. And each time she needed her diaper changed, they needed to go outside to relieve themselves.

Waking up in the middle of the night, three or four times, is awful. Waking up in the middle of the night, and being forced to stay awake for up to an hour at a time because you have to take care of 3 little ones who are dependent on you, is my personal version of hell.

Last night when Lola woke us up at 3 AM, I quickly snatched her out of her crib before letting Gizmo out into into the backyard. From the moment, I slid the door open, I knew that letting Gizmo out was a mistake. She lept off the patio and ran straight to the neighbor's fence like a racehorse with its eye on the finish line. Her high pitched repetitive barks noisely bounced off her own shadow. I flew off the patio after her, baby in one arm, and waving my other arm as if I had an invisible lasso, whispering while yelling (if such a thing is possible) "Gizmo, NO!"

Gizmo looked at us and stopped, possibly realizing that it was the middle of the night and no dog was available to return her barks. Marching all three of us back into the house, I saw a spider. A BIG spider. Like, so big that my bleary eyes saw it on our dimly lit patio. I cautiously tip-toed around it, terrifed that it would leap up and attach itself to my leg, or worse, my baby.

Back inside, I quickly laid Lola down in her crib and then grabbed a random flip flop before heading back outside.

Now, let me interrupt my own story. See, I don't like bugs. At all. Unless they are dead. Then, they are tolerable. Luckily, Josh doesn't mind playing the role of bug murderer. So usually, I find them and then I direct Josh to kill them. But, this night, I couldn't wake Josh up. It was 3 o'clock in the morning. And yet, I HAD to kill this spider. I couldn't go to bed without killing this spider. I mean, what if some how this spider got into my house and then into Lola's crib? I had to kill it. Call it my maternal instinct, call it sleep deprivation, call it what you will.

But, all it took was one SMACK and the spider was dead.

Back to bed I went, only to awake again at 4:30 AM, and then 6 AM. Later that day, I told Josh about my middle of the night adventure. He laughed and then walked outside to look at the remains. "It was a black widow," he said. I think he was proud.