Sleep

 Remember the days when you got eight hours of sleep?  Not anymore, lucky to get four hours now.   These days try to get to bed by 9 pm, load up on melatonin which will put me to sleep then about 1 am there is the urge to use the bathroom, never fails.   Getting back to sleep after that is a challenge.   When and if sleep occurs after the bathroom visit then comes the continuing nightmare of still being in high school in my old age with one more year to go, or living in some old house of days gone by that is in need of critical upkeep.   If I don’t fall back to sleep my mind fills with all kinds of thoughts, including all the subjects I can write about.   Then there is our old cat Toby who starts whining about 4 am wanting to go outside.   By then any more sleep is out of the question and salvation comes in a cup of coffee.   It is during these early morning hours when I do my writing.    By 8 am the daily chores await, including being a caregiver to Celia, making a pot of swill to get us through the day, some limited housekeeping and a trip to town once or twice a week for supplies.   With this pandemic we don’t go anywhere any more, giving me more time to write, connect with the outside world and ponder the meaning of it all. 

A good day of physical labor cutting firewood, grass or brush helps with getting an extra hour or two of sleep.   Now a days that is limited due to arthritis and nerve damage in the hands from too many years operating power equipment.   Usually can get in 4 hours of work on a good day with a break every 20 minutes.  During the hot summer afternoons or cold wet days of winter I drag myself back to the house and end up in the easy chair for a nap.   Sometimes I go into such a deep sleep when I wake have no idea where I’m at—scary!   An old friend past away a few years back as he never woke from his afternoon nap.   His wife called me informing me of his passing.   Might be the ideal way to go these days.   Sure wouldn’t be a sleep problem anymore.