Dancing in the Dark

When my four-year-old comes in our bedroom in the middle of the night and wants to crowd into "the big bed," I steer him back to his own room and lie down in bed with him. My hope being that he'll fall back to sleep before me and then I can sneak back into my own room.
As I perched on the edge of his bed last night at 3:30AM, listening for his steady breathing and trying not to get too comfortable myself, I realized this was a metaphor for the role all parents play in their children's lives.
We lurk around the fringes of our kid's lives as they get older, ready to help when we're needed or go back to our own lives when we're not. We want to be involved but not overbearing and although we think we know what's going on, we're pretty much in the dark.

song: Dancing in the Dark • artist: Bruce Springstein