“Tell us The People That Love Us, Momma.”  Sasha asks as she lays cozy in her top bunk, buried under 3 comforters but on top of the one meant for her bed. She’s surrounded by her stuffed animals and dolls, some of whom she’s given up her pillow to.  She positions her muslin blanket – had since she was a baby – over her shoulders and touching her chin, her right thumb in her mouth.

“Yes, Momma, The People That Love Us.”  Gemma echoes from her top bunk, perpendicular to Sasha’s, with same setup — four comforters, even more dolls and animals than Sasha, some of whom are in baskets she has transformed into bassinets for those under her care. They are both on the verge of sleep as I sit on the foot of Gemma’s top bunk, my hand on her calves, my gaze over at Sasha.

“Okay sweet girls. Get cozy.”  And with that, I start.  “Momma loves you.  Daddy loves you.  Papa and Grandma and Peppy love you.  Aunt Billi, Riley, Brady, Reeves and Bear….”

At some point, when Kai was two and the girls were one, Kai wanted me to “talk” to him after his goodnight books.  I indulged, but soon learned that if I wanted them to sleep, I had to do something akin to counting sheep – hypnotize him to sleep – rather than engage in conversation that would keep their (his, at the time) curious minds active.  I sat there in the Brooklyn bedroom, thinking back to when I was 19 and a freshman at Georgetown and I would go on walks and list — sometimes in my mind, silently; sometimes by talking to myself — all the things in life I was grateful for.  My parents, my intelligence.  Knowing the feeling of winning a race, knowing the feeling of losing a close one.  My opportunity, my ability to learn from mistakes.  My sister, my brothers, friends.  My favorite jeans, a soft t-shirt, memories of a first kiss, a best kiss.  Homemade chocolate chip cookies, my pretty eyes, my empathy for others.  Traveling and reading.  These lists would get me through nights where I felt restless with loneliness, fear of the unknown, questions about what I was doing.  I’d walk, and name all these things for which I was grateful. I’d walk and talk myself to a new head space, to a new peace.

Thinking of these lists of gratefulness, and how permeated they were with people that I loved and that loved me, I started telling them the people that loved them.  We lived in Brooklyn, and I thought it would be a nice way to remind them daily of the big family we had that did not get to see them as much as anyone would like.  It would be a way to remind them that their world wasn’t limited to the love in our house, but expanded well beyond.

“Uncle Chip, Uncle Cookie, Colleen and Allen.  Crazy Grandma and Uncle Lonnie.”  The order is always the same.  Some pets included, some not, for no other reason than I get the names confused sometimes and the list is way too long.  “Uncle Shorty, Aunt Pammy, Aunt Cindy, Cousin Angie and Lori and Baby Camille and Baby Jillian.”  Some people are left out of the specific naming.  When I started this, while I had daydreams of them being adults and remembering fondly how nice this nightly tradition was – maybe they’ll even mention it when they win an Academy Award or write an acknowledgement in their Pulitzer Prize winning novel! – I also didn’t think I would be saying the names every single night for going on six years, and hadn’t considered how big my family is. (Have I written about how big my family is?  It’s big.  It’s huge! The “small” side of my family is my mom’s side, which still outnumbers most families I know by about 300%.) “Cousin Scotty and Grasan.”

I go onto my dad’s side of the family, the Hart side, which outnumbers most families by about 10,000%.  “Grandpa Bob, Aunt Mary, Uncle Jimmy.…” I go on, and on.  Sometimes, I go on uninterrupted.  Sometimes, they are full of interruptions.  If I skip a name they have come to expect, they remind me.  Some nights they interrupt to ask if Grandpa Ray and Grandma Bevi love them from heaven or wherever their energy might be.  They ask a question about our relationship to someone or the relationship between two people I list.  There are questions about death, and a debate about whether love disappears when our pets or grandparents or friends die.  There are questions about types of love, and how love happens.  There are nights when they want to go over the memories of each person I list — their memories, or, more frequently, my memories.  The questions are never easily answered, never simple and shallow (why would they be at bedtime?!).  Tonight, however, they are just listening.  “Corrie, Mandy, Robbie, Ryan, Jenny, Kylanne.  Aunt Natalie and Uncle Steve and Cousin Annie and Clay. Ari and Trey.  All of Mommy’s family and Daddy’s family. Your teachers, classmates, coaches, teammates, friends in Brooklyn, friends in Los Angeles.”  I name many, I can’t name them all.  But the love builds, they feel the love I acknowledge and love I invite in with this list.  Gemma once described my house as a castle where she felt wrapped up in love.  These names are part of the love I sprinkle into the air every night.  No matter how their energy was when the list started, it always becomes peaceful and tranquil and meditative.  Their breaths become deeper, slower.  If there is a zone of love, they are certainly in it.   Every night.

Like clockwork, I can sense them lingering on the border of awake and asleep, conscious and unconscious.  A few years ago, the power of these in-between-moments hit me: when I was 15, my mom bought me tapes that helped me visualize my swim races.  A peaceful narrator would coach me into relaxation, visualizing cells of power and strength and stamina and endurance going from my toes to my head every night, and then encourage me to visualize my race and have all these cells burst open right when I needed them.  I would fall asleep mid-way through the tapes every night, but the tapes would play through, straight through the headphones I used so as not to disrupt my sister with whom I shared a room, straight into my ear, my mind.  I had always been talented, always an even harder worker in the pool, but that was the year that I swam out of my mind and beyond my ability.  My mind and body benefitting from little cells of stamina and endurance and power and strength that I had previously not known (or forgotten) that I had.  At some point I started believing my lists of people that loved them were getting my kids to that zone where their minds might be open to mantras that their conscious minds might resist in waking hours.  So I go on…every night….

“There are so many people that love you and that you are going to love.  Most of all, you love yourselves.  You are always going to treat yourself and others with respect and kindness, love and gentleness and forgiveness and warmth.  You are going to open yourself up to the world, bravely and courageously.  You are going to let people get to know you, and you are going to get to know them.”  Can I carve these mindsets into them?  Can I hypnotize them to be warm and open and brave and vulnerable? I will try.

“You are going to leave a positive impact on all the places you go, all the people you meet, and all the animals you come across.  You are going to try new things, and go new places.  Some will be fun, some scary, some exciting, some challenging.  You will learn something from them all and be grateful that you got to experience so much.”   Can my words have the same impact as those little cells of strength and power and stamina that I visualized when I was 15? I hope so.

“You are going to make choices you are proud of, every day, and be open to all the other feelings you experience. You are going to be proud of a life well lived, and content in the deepest parts of your heart even as you feel other emotions next to that content. You will feel all sorts of things next to that content and you will always be okay, you will be content because you let yourself feel everything.”  Can I help them understand that a content life is one where you can handle sadness as well as happiness; excitement and pride as well as disappointment; fear as well as courage; love as well as heartbreak.  I believe so, if I lead by example, too.

“Your worlds are going to be big.  Your minds are going to be broad. Your hearts are going to be full. Every night, I want you to have the sweetest dreams of all the things you love.  And every night, I will dream of you three.”  Can I make them feel worthy of an incredible life at the same time I give them the tools to use to make their life incredible?  Yes, I can.

Though I always finish the mantra, they are usually asleep well before I wish them sweet dreams.  But tonight — tonight I look over at Sasha, and though nothing moving but the rise and fall of her chest, her eyes are wide open, staring right at me, peeking out from her muslin blanket and cocoon of comforters.  “Sasha, your life is going to be so good, sweet girl. So, so good.”

And with this little extra addition, something super special happens. The corners of her mouth reach for her eyes at the same time they broaden to her ears, and her whole mouth extends into a smile and sparkles and twinkles illuminate from her brown eyes, lighting up every corner of her bedroom and every star in the sky.

“I know, Momma.”

The smile and the sparkle and her voice embody Conviction, a deep Knowing down in her bones.  No words do that sparkle, that knowing, that smile, justice.  I know if I say more I will cry, but I can’t stop looking at her smile.  I want this moment to live forever. I breathe in the air that feels like it is tingling with cells of stamina and strength and power.

“I know, too, sweet girl.  Your life is going to be amazing.”

“It already is, Momma.”

A tear rolls down my right cheek, then another and then more.   She looks at me.  She watches  me, and I let the tears roll down and float by the corners of my own big smile.  She has no doubt what is wrapped up in these particular tears she sees.  She closes her eyes but her big smile remains, remnants of the goodnight mantra that will be told 3,000 more times floating through the air and through her body.