Last night, Nini and Carter came over for dinner. After dinner, Carter was a little fussy trying to go to sleep and Lucy said, "Can Carter and Nini go home now? That screaming is hurting my ears. He's too screamy. It's DREADFUL."
Before I could chide her for being rude, I had to laugh. That, dreadful? "Dreadful," as in filled with dread, the emotion that overtakes you every evening at 7 in anticipation of the two straight hours of screaming between 10 and midnight. Dreadful is seeing that first flash on the baby monitor: the beast is stirring. Dreadful is 2 a.m., feeling like no one else in the world is awake except you and the beast.
I know dreadful, kiddo, and it was YOU.