Toads-in-the-Hole

A few weeks ago Adelaide and I were messing around on the floor, as we do. She would grab something and bring it over to show me. Sometimes she would ask me what it was (I think), sometimes she would tell me what it was, and quite often she would insist that she had brought me a "Dog!"

Then, after a while, she went over to this bookcase

Then she grabbed a book (Sandra Boynton's Barnyard Dance), dragged it over, handed it to me, then crawled into my lap. This, I realized, was the moment of my lap's destiny. My lap's entire existence had been building toward this moment, its entire reason for being finally fulfilled. All those years of hosting cats and small dogs were mere distractions or, at best, practice for this moment: My daughter wanted to sit in my lap while I read to her.

It's good to know what you're for.