when i say i would die for my daughter, it doesn't only mean i would give her a vital organ or make her drink the last of the water in a desert or take her place in front of an oncoming speeding vehicle or pull her out of a burning building. it also means i will die thousands upon thousands of small deaths - i watched the seconds of my life tick slowly away as i endured the mind-numbing boredom of watching an infant attempt a simple puzzle, i took years off my life when i made myself sick with lack of sleep or stress or worry, i feel a pain close to death as i stand and make awkward small talk with other parents at school events, my heart breaks when i put her in time out or angrily send her to bed early. i see her grow older and the parts of her dependent on me begin to disappear, a part of me will die when she says her first teenage "i hate you" and the part of me that lived only to keep her alive will wither away as she waves goodbye to go off to her first apartment. years upon years of putting her needs ahead of myself, hundreds of thousands of dollars to give her everything she could possibly want, thousands of hours wondering how i could ever make it through another day. so what could i do on her one and only 9th birthday but take her to this horrid lazy movie about these monsters sent from some cutesy marketing hell that i can't seem to escape? well, all things considered this wasn't so bad - annoying, boring, baffling but harmless. fine. she laughed, and the light from her beautiful face will lead me through any darkness. i have suffered much worse before and i will continue to suffer, not because i have to, but because she's a treasure and i'm a sucker who can never say no, and as much as it pains me sometimes it's truly a joy to sacrifice for her.

now let us never speak of this again.