DAY 11--THESE BABIES WILL KILL US ALL

I have a friend who works with the homeless in Los Angeles. She once told me that anyone, deprived of sleep for 3 days will start to show signs of insanity. Julie and I are clearly starting to show serious signs of insanity. But before we go any further, please consider this moment of family togetherness.

There we are, in our living room, having some quality time with our lovely sons. We are smiling, the boys are smiling (as much as they can at 10 days), and all is good in the world. But there is a darker side, a side that starts... eh... sometime after midnight. That's when these good natured boys turn into something more like... THIS!

Hang on, that's the wrong picture. Here, they're cute and mostly asleep. But at night, they're still cute, but not mostly asleep...

That's more like it. Notice the haunting gaze of Nate, cutting through the darkness. Cute, but not asleep. We've worked very hard to get the twins on a synchronized sleep schedule, if not with us, at least with each other. But it's not an easy thing to do. There are a bunch of books with hints on the subject. Some say you can get your kids on a regular sleep schedule within 3 weeks or so.

But there is one small hitch... according to the books timeline, our kids haven't been born yet. They're still negative one week old. I don't completely understand this, but it has something to do with child development and the explanation is probably contained in the stacks of baby books on the side of the bed that I've never bothered to read. But I've gathered that it has something to do with the fact that our twins were born 2 weeks early. For now, the doctors say, "Do anything the kids want." (Oh yeah? What if the kids want us to rob a bank?)

So we're stuck for a while. Lately we've been trying to give the kids more exercise, in the form of "tummy time."

It looks totally boring, but it's supposed to help babies develop their leg or head muscles or something. But you can't get too bored by it, because of babies sleep on their stomachs, they die of Sudden Infant Death Syndrome, which is a real downer.

So anyway, we're tired, really tired. One night I was in the glider chair, trying to burp Will. I was so tired, I almost fell off the chair. I was quite worried I would actually crush the poor child. That would also be a downer.

But sometimes the haze has an advantage. While I was holding will that night, I gazed down at him as he struggled to stay awake

As I moved a blanket away from the side of his face, I blinked my eyes and saw something I can only describe as an apparition. What I saw wasn't a baby, but a full grown adult. It was Will at about 24 years old. He was handsome and had strong features, although his hair was starting to thin. He seemed to be OK. Then I blinked my eyes again and the image was gone, lost in the murky night of a sleep deprived dad.