My kids think I’m obsessed with the word please.
Why is it so important, they whine, what’s the big deal? I make them a list one night. A list they won’t possibly understand for twenty to thirty years, but I am trying to write things down:
Because you will find that the fruit will drop, but rarely into your mouth.
Because the bathroom faucet sticks, and please makes the stronger hand less weary.
Because on summer nights the expectant sky cloaks the trees like a bed sheet, and storm cells spit tornados toward us from deeper south, and the willow oak in the backyard is a monster, and every night we lie down at its feet. Because we never taught you to pray.
Because at night you are thirsty.
Because someday your children, on the other side of your wall, will cackle into the darkness long past their bedtime.
Because right now through the open windows I can hear the newlyweds next door carving out a backyard patio by lamplight, deliberating as they kneel together in their yard, placing flagstones. The stones they hand each other are heavy and oddly shaped. And they must level each one in the dirt—tapping, cajoling, and swaddling the difficult rocks—and then make their way upstairs to bed.
Because the s in please is the sweetest sound, like steam rising after a summer shower, like a baby whispering in his bed.
Because you are human, and it is your nature to ask for more.
Because want, need—those unlit cul-de-sacs—are too perilous unadorned.