ummmm...sleepy

despite the fact that the school year will end in 9 days i have not gotten used to getting up at 6 am to get the girl up and ready to get on the bus at 6:45am. really, 6am is just....cruel. oddly enough, aside from one day when i was overcome w/ allergies, i have not gone back to bed after the house was empty since i've been laid off. oh, trust me, i've thought about it, just about every day when i wake up, but then i get everyone up, get them off and get on the computer or start laundry or something.

sleep has always been one of my very best friends. i've heard stories of when i was a baby and apparently back then sleep and i didn't know each other that well. my parents would try to get us acquainted by driving me around in the car. to this day transportation of any kind puts me to sleep. i think it's the rhythmic humming and vibrations of motors.

like most teens i slept in late on weekends, at least as late as my mom would let me, maybe 11? noon? i'd usually been up late reading. i certainly wasn't out partying because i was a model child in high school, much to the hubs chagrin. even when we were out on dates i think my curfew was maybe 11 pm at the latest.

during my freshman year of college sleep not only became my best friend, but also my protector. i didn't realize it at the time, but i started a pattern then that's followed me to this day--i escape stress/depression/anxiety/etc. by sleeping. i didn't realize how stressed or maybe depressed (being away from my family for the first time--i know, i know, but at that age i didn't realize how very fucked up my family was) i was my freshman year but i do remember taking a lot of naps. i slept a lot. i think my roommate felt the same way. i can remember some weekends, if neither of us had gone home, where we'd basically sleep all day. and at that time it wasn't because i'd been out all night or hung over---those days came later.

fast forward several years to the hubs and i, living in that cute bungalow, who'd sleep extra, extra late on weekends. like 2pm late. we had no kids, the hubs had a job that had him up at the ass crack of dawn at least 5 sometimes 6 days a week, and we'd stay up till all hours of the night. sleep was again my friend, but i didn't need it as a protector, at least not on a regular basis.

fast forward several more years to when the girl was born. sleep went on vacation, at least the sleep i'd come to know and love. no more sleeping in till noon, no more staying up until all hours of the night, well, not on purpose anyway. sleep back then, and again when the boy came along, was more like a mistress. i stole illicit moments w/ sleep, napping when the baby napped, crashing when the baby fell asleep at night.

it was a very happy day in life when both kids were older, old enough to get up in the mornings on their own, make a bowl of cereal (or god forbid eat chips or cheese nips or ice cream) and watch cartoons for an hour or two. sleeping in on the weekends has always been one of my favorite things.

over the last couple of years sleep has come to visit me earlier in the evenings. for the longest time it was not uncommon for the hubs and i to stay up until 12, 1 even 2 am, even on week nights, turn around and get up the next morning and go from there. however, as i've gotten older, sleep now sneaks up on me, sometimes as early as 9 or 10pm and lays with me on the couch until the hubs is ready for bed.

also as i've gotten older sleep has met pms. for about one or two days while i'm pmsing sleep turns into a violent task master and i become narcoleptic. during these bouts if i sit still for more than 20 minutes i am liable to fall asleep, instantly and uncontrollably.

i think the hubs has always been a bit jealous of my relationship w/ sleep. i have never really been on the outs w/ sleep, never found it elusive. oh, don't get me wrong, maybe 2-3 times in the past 20-30 years sleep and i have had a falling out. but, for the most part it comes to me easily and swiftly. sometimes, when we've gone to bed and are lying there talking, i've been known to fall asleep mid-sentence. i can feel it coming on, but am helpless to prevent it. the hubs, however, has a hard time meeting sleep.

i welcome the peacefulness of sleep, the cozy feeling of burrowing into the covers; the knowledge that at least for a time i will be suspended in bliss with no demands, nothing to be done, no speaking, no thinking, just bliss. i love everything about sleep. i love flirting on the edges of it, dipping my toes into it when you're drowsy, when you know the full on sleep is coming and you're helpless to prevent it so you just throw yourself into it wholeheartedly. it creeps up and embraces you and snuggles you down into bliss.