Awake! 

Sleep patterns definitely change at different times in your life, and of course, depend on what you do during your awake time. My dad would naturally wake early, and be wide-awake – get up, make himself a cup of tea while the rest of us were asleep -and sometimes for the milkman if he was early! If the weather was pleasant he might go out and do some work in the garden, or if it wasn’t he’d no doubt catch up with chores, or the newspaper, or knit, waiting until it was time to wake the rest of us. I’ve never been quite like my dad, but I definitely need less sleep than most, stay up late and get up at the normal time… at least I did.

My sleeping has changed greatly. I still am awake late (in fact I think I need more than twenty-four hours in the day, to be awake and have sleep) but getting up now isn’t as instant or easy as it used to be. Of course, now I’m lucky enough not to have a day job, and our days are often without any particular thing which we have to do. Obviously there are plenty of things we do, we’re busy, have activities, go out, do chores, go places, but through choice!  So, most mornings, I sleep through the radio coming on at seven, and miss most of the news until I emerge into the wake-world well after eight.

Last night, for whatever reason I couldn’t get to sleep. Usually  I go to bed when it seems time, and then I read, maybe for an hour or two, and then I snuggle down and after catching up with the story in my head, I slip into dreams. Last night, I’d continued to edit my work in progress (a euphemisms for the actual state of play with my latest novel) I’d read the next gripping chapters in the Marion Todd book I’m re-reading, “Lies to Tell”, and I’d put my book down, turned off the light, and prepared to drift away. Except… the tide of sleep had gone out and left me stranded on the sandbanks of wakefulness.  I turned over and tried again. After a while, I tried lying on my front, then my back, then on my usual sleeping side… Awake!

I decided to go through the settling down process again, and began to read another few chapters. I must be sleepy by now, closed book, light off, snuggled down… and – Awake! For whatever reason, despite feeling really tired and wanting to nod off, I just remained alert and not a-slumber. Eventually, several hours later, I did mange to sleep fitfully, and woke late, and somewhat grumpy despite a cup of tea. The result was I’ve been tired and jaded today, not achieved much, slumped about, felt dull and uninspired and ignored the chores I needed to do and the tasks I really ought to have done.

I’m sure tonight will be better – it’s very unusual for me to have a night like last night!