Naked

2:00 AM to 4:00AM is a dangerous time. There's nothing on television except infomercials, bad reruns, and quacks giving advice. I don't sleep well and I'm a sucker so I watch them all.

The other night, the quack of the moment made some profound announcement about learning to love and accept yourself. It involved standing naked in front of a full-length mirror. I have some advice of my own: Don't Do It! If you decide to ignore this advice, don't do it at 3:00 AM.

I'm not a prude. I find the human body beautiful in many forms. I've been skinny-dipping (in the dark.) Michelangelo's "David" is one of my favorite works of art. I change clothes in front of other women without giving it a thought. Here's a shocker: The husband has seen me naked.

But now that I know what he sees, those days may be over.

Paying Attention

Even when I seem to be ignoring advice coming my way, I am paying attention.

The experts say that children learn by example. They're paying attention to your actions far more than your words. We don't have young children anymore but I could definitely list our mistakes. Still, they managed to become good human beings. Like me, they've spent their entire lives surrounded in love. It's frightening to recognize how many children don't have that in their lives.

That tight wire act where you try to help someone without offending them is tricky business. When they're children, you have a captive audience. They cannot escape. As adults, whether it's parent to child, friend to friend or something else, the safety net is not quite as reliable. I know people who do not speak to their siblings. I know people who see or talk to their parents a couple of times each year. This is as foreign to me as living on Mars.

I'm no expert but I have a lot of experience with unsolicited advice. I let it run through my head as I try to fall asleep. My eyes may have glazed over and I may pretend to be ignoring you but trust me, I heard you and I was paying attention.

Some people get annoyed. I get encouraged. I may not heed it immediately but I heard you.

What Time Is It?

My room in Manhattan is quite spacious, as New York hotel rooms go. I'm not one of those people who complains about hotel rooms. I need a clean bathroom, a semi-comfortable bed, a desk and a chair. I'm set.

As all semi-insomniacs know, we have a perverse need to know the time. If I wake at 2:00 AM, I will try to lull myself back to sleep. If I wake at 5:00 AM, the time it will take to get back to sleep isn't worth the effort. I'll just get up.

The clock in my room is very new age and probably expensive. You can play/charge/awake to your iPod. (I didn't bring mine.) But, it's bolted to the nightstand and faces the middle of the room rather than the bed. To see the time, I have to sit up, move over and practically get out of bed.

It never occurred to me to pack Hangdog's "ding" watch -- the one that loudly announces the time. Since we inherited it, I may make it a permanent part of my packing list.

Fretting

Just so you know I am not so self-absorbed that I forget to stress about things that don't really involve my day to day life, let me share a few. I worry about:

Friends who are looking for a job and how I could possibly help.
My parents, who always seem to get the short end of the stick when it comes to attention.
Friends and family dealing with various oldie situations.
What our young people are learning or more importantly, not learning.

Oh, I do a good job of fretting about the obvious:

The husband
The children
Money
My business
Friends

The rational part of my brain tells me this fretting serves no purpose. But if you have a way to turn it off, call me at 3:00AM and we'll discuss it.

3:00 AM

Last night I shot out of bed at 3:00 AM. I had a great idea for a project I am involved with. This might seem a little odd but I wasn't sleeping anyway.

Something has re-fired in my brain. Instead of worrying about someone falling, what we're having for dinner, the next auto accident, I've begun to settle back into the brain cells that click for me. I'm proud of my conduct with the oldies -- remember we still have Hangdog -- but it's sort of fun to reclaim my space, my brain, my marriage, the children and my goals. I pretended it wasn't true but I existed on autopilot for a while.

While You Are Sleeping

Some people sleep all night -- you lucky people!

Here are some of the things I do while you are sleeping:

Say lots of prayers.
Wash a load of clothing and fold it.
Make writing or business notes.
Plan menus, even though I don't cook very often.
Fret and pace.
Watch episodes of I Love Lucy or The Andy Griffith Show.
Unload the dishwasher.
Re-read the last People Magazine.
Wake the dog up so we can both be miserably awake together.
Make to-do lists of things that will never get done.
Watch movies that I've seen over and over and over.
Go through emails and respond/delete.
Tackle the stack of mail and catalogs.
Sneak in the oldies' room to see if any new ghosts have come to visit.
Sit in the baby's room and wallow in the memories.
Call people who might be up. I know who you are.

Eventually, I crawl into bed and (as I'm told,) start to snore. It's the husband's time to get up and escape. I'll grab two hours and then get up to work out.

By the way, he paces and snores too.

Sleep Envy

Restful sleep is no longer an easy process. I don't understand why or when this happened. I used to be able to fall asleep and stay asleep with no problem. Those days appear to be over. My parents used to joke that you could run a train through my room and I wouldn't wake up. I long for those days.

The oldies are good sleepers. She may prowl around during the night, but she has no problem curling up in bed (during the day) and accompanying him on a long winter's nap. The husband can announce that he's going to watch TV and be asleep in his chair in 30 seconds. He can get on an airplane and be asleep before we take off.

When the baby is here, his agenda is sleep. I used to think it was growth spurts but now I think he's inherited some gene that allows him to fall asleep at will.

The Unabomber can sleep anywhere ... a chair, the kitchen table, the car ... it doesn't matter. I know he's old but how tired can he be? Even the puppy has a sleep routine that seems to work for her.

I've tried all the tricks. Great sheets and lavender linen spray. Games in my head to bore myself. TV on; TV off. It's 1:03. It's 3:20. It's 4:25. Oops, now it's time to get up.

I'm jealous of those people who can sleep.