How do you sleep?

My entire life I've struggled with my sleep schedule.

I am a night owl. I always have been, and I am afraid, I always will be.

I come alive at 9 pm, and am happy to be awake through all of the nighttime hours. 

No matter how much sleep I get, I hate being woken up in the early morning.

I also seem to need many more hours of sleep than most people deem appropriate.

My mother's mother always was a short sleeper. 

She would go to sleep around midnight, and was up at 4 or 5 am every day to see my grandfather off to work. She didn't go back to bed after he left, and she never took naps, claiming that this was all the sleep she needed.

I, however, am able to sleep like it's my job - and I am employee of the year.

I can easily sleep 10 - 12 hours, no problem, and also stay up for 18 - 22+ hours easily as well.

If I were a childless artist, this wouldn't be a problem. 

Unfortunately I live in the real world, and have two kids who have to be up, dressed, washed, fed, and out the door to school at a very specific time ever. damn. day. 

I am on a first name basis with the attendance secretary at their school.

Why are we late? Again?

Because...because..because we JUST ARE, OK?!

There was a study done - I forget where and I forget by who because I'm bad at sourcing my facts - that essentially isolated a group of people, and allowed them to sleep and be awake 100% on their own schedule, so long as certain tasks were completed within a 24 hour period. In the beginning of the study, almost everyone stayed on their current sleep routine - going to bed around 10 or 11 pm, rising between 6 and 8 am. The majority of people though, were very sluggish and unproductive in these early morning hours. 

As the study went on, the group broke off into three main sleep schedules:

People who stayed up late, were highly productive at night, and slept through most of the daylight hours, and for longer stretches of time. 

People who went to bed very early, rose very early, and were productive on an off through out the day, with several naps at various intervals. 

And last, people who slept for a few hours at a time, were awake for an almost equal few hours, and then went back to sleep for another chunk of time. This group typically experienced a larger chunk of wakefulness in the late morning/early afternoon, where they were also the most productive. 

The study basically showed that there is no set amount of sleep that each person needs, nor is there a "right" or "wrong" time of day to be awake, and productive.

Still though, I feel like a total loser for staying up until 3 or 4 in the morning, and then sleeping until noon. Or, going to bed at 10 or 11 at night, and sleeping until 9 or 10 the next day. 

I feel like an order to be a "responsible" adult, or a productive member of society, I have to be awake by 8 am, productive all day, and in bed by 10. 

I'm not sure it will ever happen, so if you ever need someone to talk to and make tater tots with at 2 am, you know who to call. 

Can We Still Sleep Together?

Can we still sleep together?

I don't necessarily mean have sex, I mean sleep.
It doesn't have to be a big deal. It can just be because I'm super warm, and you know exactly how to hold me. 

On the occasional Saturday night when neither of us have plans, when both of us are tired of pretending we don't miss each other, when there doesn't seem to be any reason not to, can we sleep together still?

Can we get Chinese food and meet at your house in our pajamas, and watch an old movie on Netflix in bed?

Can we fall asleep together at the exact same time, our bodies moving back into the familiar positions that we've trained each other to assume: me on my right side, you as the big spoon, your arm scooping me up and pulling me in, our fingers tangled together like the roots of Willow trees?
Slipping away, heavy and warm, the rhythm of our hearts tapping out the most familiar lullaby there is.
Like sailors who miss the smell of the sea even if they know they can no longer return to it, I will bury my face in your chest and feel sated.
It's probably my favorite thing to do with you; lying still in your arms and waiting for my mind to close it's doors.
When I'm in your bed I never have to wait very long for it to come.

In the morning we can go back to being broken up.

We can go back to being just friends who don't do things like sleep in the same bed, or ever admit they feel lost sometimes without the steady gaze of the other person.

We'll retreat away and privately put ourselves back together.
I won't tell anybody if you won't.

But just every once in a while, can we still sleep together?

Monday Momisms: The Best Part of the Day

When you raise kids, the days can be long.

So long.

Like "I've been waiting for it to be bedtime since we woke up" long.

Sometimes it seems like it just won't end. 

Like if you hear Mommy one more time, you're going to snap. 

Like if you have to put another episode of Dora on Netflix for the kids, you're going to strangle her with her smug, self entitled asshole of a back pack.

"I'm the Map!" 

GOOD FOR YOU.  I'm the Mom, I do everything, but you don't hear me singing a whole fucking song about it, DO YOU?!

After a while you start to keep little hidden pieces of the day tucked away. They're special. They're favorite hours in the midst of all the monotony and exhaustion and questions and FOR THE LOVE OF GOD WHO PEED IN HERE?!

Like mornings.

I hate mornings, in general. The getting up early, the showering when you're still half asleep and accidentally got in before the water was hot, and all the little things that have to be done before you leave the house. But morning with kids are sweet. Jackson is always in a sweet and talkative mood, but still a little bit sleepy and slow moving. So as he's stumbling around the room trying to dress himself, he's also filling me in on his dreams, what he wants to do at daycare today, who his best friends are, how rocket ships work, what he wants for dinner, and what a good boy he's going to be at school. 

Lainie is quiet, and somber in the morning, like me. Quietly shuffling about the house, mumbling good morning and getting dressed. If she had big black sunglasses, she'd wear them and carry around a cup of steaming coffee if she was allowed to have caffeine. But, once we get in the car and start driving to school, I turn the radio on, and sing to her in the rear view mirror. She always smiles, and eventually starts singing along. The next thing you know all three of us are having a 7 a.m. dance party on the way to daycare, and nobody is in a grumpy early morning mood.

And bedtime.

This is a favorite for the obvious reason that the kids go to sleep and I get a break, but also because of everything that comes before that. The showers that produce sparkling clean little angels, the clean jammies that smell like laundry soap, bedtime stories with all three of us in my bed, cuddles and late night whispered conversations. And then that sweet moment where even if I am not in their room, even if I can't see them at all, I know they've fallen asleep because the house feels different. It's quiet in a way that it never is when they're awake, even if they aren't making noise. It's peaceful and calm, and I can tell their little bodies have settled down and their breathing slow and their heart beats steadied, and they're safe and sound in their beds.

Those are the best times of even the worst days.

The Friday Diary: A Week of Worry and Healing

It's Friday. 

Finally.

I don't have a whole bunch of pictures of what we ate or the things we did, because we ate things like pizza and left over spaghetti in between getting home from work/daycare and going to the hospital to visit my dad.

Oh, yeah, we also ate hospital food.

It wasn't awesome, nor was it picture worthy.

But, the good news is my dad's surgery went as well as could be expected. As of right now, they're calling the surgery curative, and chemotherapy is not being recommended at this time.

That's exactly how the doctor put it.

It was some of the best news I've gotten in my life.

For those of you who sent emails, text messages and left comments or private messages, encouraging and comforting and checking in, thank you.

Really, thank you.

I might not have written back to all of you. 

I might not have sounded as grateful as I was.

But every single "how are you doing?" or "how is your dad?" or "Thinking of you' message meant the world to me.

And in case you were wondering, I did end up taking the day off. 

And Wednesday too.

I waited in the waiting room, I fed my father ice chips, and I watched T.V. with the kids and ate chocolate covered pretzels. We healed. We coped. We were thankful for good news. 

And we napped. A lot.

Napping is good.

So, that was our week.

And now it's Friday, and I just have to get through one more day before I can have an All-Pajamas-All-The-Time weekend with the kids while Bill is in California with his kids.

It's gonna be awesome.

Happy Friday.

I hope you all have a quiet, predominantly pajamas only attired weekend, with the people you love. The people you would take the day off work to wait for in the hospital if they were having surgery.

2012 Photo Challenge: Sleep

This is Orso. 

I never sleep without him.

Sleep

I love sleep. 

I love sleep more than I love a lot of other things.

I love the delicious, heavy feeling of sleep. I love waking up from a very deep and comforting sleep, only slightly, realizing I don't have to get up yet, and drifting back down into my slumber. Falling asleep feels like the most heavenly type of sinking. Sand drifting to the bottom of a glass of water. A mermaid, relaxing her whole body and just free floating all the way 

down, down, down

to whatever deep and pillowy home awaits her at the bottom of the sea.

Sleep is dark and warm, like chocolate, or a hug.

It is heavy and dense. It comes down on top of you like a full winter blanket, and weights you down to the bed so you do not float away.

Sleep is solid, and it anchors you lovingly.

In sleep you can explore your whole mind, in the course of only a few hours. You can recall that house you lived in when you were four, that boy you had a crush on in 3rd grade, that old fear you have of milk, or Freddie Kruger, or wild dogs.

You can do anything in dreams. Cloaked in the silky fabric of a good sleep.

I despise bedtimes for adult people. I hate the idea of "going to bed early" to prepare for an event the next day. I long to live in a world where we can sleep when we wish. Nap for a few minutes at 10 in the morning, or for hours in the middle of the day. Go to bed when you feel sleepy, rise when you feel rested and ready.

Unrealistic, surely.

But a girl can dream.

There are days when I find myself awaiting sleep from the time I wake up.

Longing for it like a distant lover. Wishing the day would pass quickly so I could be done with my chores and responsibilities and return to bed.

There are days when my eyes are so heavy, as soon as my children are in bed I am fast asleep as well. 

At their bedside, in the bathtub, on the couch with the T.V. flickering and playing shadow puppets on my body.

But there are nights when sleep escapes me.

When sleep is as elusive and distant as the moon, a cool jewel somewhere in the distance that knows it is desired, but will not present itself. 

I toss and turn in bed

Look at books with bleary eyes

Pick up and put down my pen over and over.

But mostly on those nights

{like tonight}

I think of you.

I wonder: if you were here, would I be able to sleep?

Is this restlessness a testament to the empty side of my bed?

Is this useless turning all my way of burning off the longing that lives inside my chest?

And I wonder if you will ever really be here...on the left side of the bed, warm and sleepy and made of love.

If you will ever be as constant in my days and nights as the rising and falling of the moon or the sun.

Will I ever turn on my side and know you will be there?

Will I ever be able to wake you in the night and complain of my sleeplessness, to have you hold my head to your chest and recite Alice in Wonderland

{only my favorite part}

Until my eyes are heavy and sleep finally takes me?

Or will every sleepless night, forever after, consist of me haunting these halls and saying your name, and wondering whether your simple presence, your mere existence in this creaking house, whether that would cure my pacing, and bring me

Sleep.