TISSUE! TISSUE!

Sunday morning and I had fixed breakfast for my three beautiful girls. There they sat at our breakfast bar, still in their night clothes, happily eating away; right to left in order- mommy, oldest daughter and youngest daughter.  In the background the blue waters of the Chesapeake Bay sparkling outside of the windows, it was a scene of pure beauty and happiness.

I thought to myself that this must be an illusion, a dream and any moment I was going to snap awake and find myself back in the early 1980s, living in a hovel like a hermit trying desperately to work my way through college. That thought often haunts me because surely a slob like me should never have attained this level of happiness- it is simply against the laws of nature. Indeed, I could very likely be having a sweet dream.

Then, suddenly, my six-year-old snorts, sniffs and abruptly reaches up from her breakfast wiggling her tiny fingers and demands, “Tissue! Tissue!”

Nope- this is reality, because an illusion would not have the snot.