Hot digity dog

What possesses me, I do not know.
Every once in a while I crave a chili dog. I think it has something to do with growing up around all those street dog vendors, and the weekly trip to Rutt's Hut (most Sunday nights).
Last night, I quelled my hunger for chili dogs.
As usual when I indulge this insane urge, I finished my meal and groaned, "why did I eat that?"
I only eat a chili dog every 2-3 years. There is something about the idea of it that is just so much better than the real thing.Isaac loved it. He likes chili quite a bit, and he had fun eating the messy dog. Josiah, having had a recent bout of the stomach yuck, begged off this time and had peanut butter on a tortilla shell.
Daniel was apparently bored with the whole thing and fell asleep in his booster eating a zwiback toast. Yum.
It was a blast to have chili dogs together, though.
We finished the night off with a game of Yhatzee, and Josiah blew everyone away. He got yhatzee twice!
I love nights like last night; I love the simple everyday pleasure of my son's voices, how they sound at nine and five and eight months old.
On nights like this I am acutely aware that there are only so many of these nights in a lifetime; that one day my sons will be grown. This awareness, this painful knowledge of what is to come, what must come, makes me so aware of the moment we are in. It makes me love the looks on their faces, their silly noises, their shrill excitement and laughter-lit eyes.
Oh, if only I could hold them, squeeze them to me and never let them go, never leave this moment.
But I cannot, and it is over all too soon, boys tucked into their beds, silently sleeping, dreaming.
I listen to them breathe. I bless the life in them.
There will be other nights like this in our home, like there have been many times before, and I will hold on to them for as long as I can. I will soak them in. I will not wish them away.
And one day, when my sons are in their own homes playing games with my grandchildren, I will pull the memories of these nights out of my heart and I will remember. I will always remember.