My favorite part of every day comes around 8:30 p.m., when it’s time to put L to bed for the night. The process of shushing her and rocking her until she passes out is—and always has been—my job.

It is, quite frankly, the only aspect of fatherhood with which I’ve never needed practice.

I’m not sure why I’m so good at it. I can shush for hours. I enjoy squatting and rocking. My right shoulder is also uncharacteristically resilient; it rarely if ever gets tired.

The pre-bed sequence begins when I collect L from her mother (the baby usually gets breast-fed right before sleep). I hoist L up on my shoulder and she clutches the collar of my shirt. When we first start, she’s kicky, and she whaps her legs into my chest as I waltz her upstairs. By the time we’re in her bedroom, the kicking usually has stopped, and her body starts to relax.

In her room, I start shushing. I’m staccato with my shushes; usually shh-shh-shhhhhh. To mix it up on occasion, I’ll throw a long shhhhhh in there for good measure, too.

As I shush her, I bounce gently up and down. Once a minute or so, I do an all-out squat.

On most nights, five minutes of this routine puts her out. I know she’s asleep when her hand lets go of my shirt collar, and when I can feel her little breaths on the back of my neck slow down. I bring her into our guest room, lay her on the bed, and put her in her Halo SleepSack.

Shushing resumes immediately, only this time, I pick her up and cradle her in my arms, rocking back and forth. This new position is critical for placement into her crib; it’s the only way I can lay her down gently without disrupting the rocking until the very moment I’m ready to pull my arms away.

Once I’ve laid her down, I continue shushing until I’m quite literally out the door, which I close behind me with a smile (from this point forward, we use the monitor to keep tabs on her).

In all, the process takes about 15 minutes. In that time, I am completely rejuvenated, energized and humbled by how complete this little being makes me feel. No matter what kind of day I’ve had, the pre-bed sequence puts me in a good place for the rest of the night.

I’m not sure how I previously managed to endure my own bedtime without it.