Midnight Mass Malaise
I’m feeling totally groggy and stupified owing to imprudent consumption of caffeine yesterday that kept me up past 3:00 this morning. It’s the same feeling I remember from Midnight Mass as a little kid. My mom always insisted that we go to bed at, like, 8:30 PM, then she’d wrench us out of bed an hour and a half later--right in the midst of the deep, slow-wave stage of sleep.
You don’t recover from that, let me tell you. What I remember most about Midnight Mass was emitting a series of ungovernable, nonstop yawns and an overwhelming muzziness that never lifted--not even after Mass was over and we walked home in subzero temperatures. I don’t know quite how my mom figured this pre-Mass shut-eye benefited us, but she was, after all, the woman who established my bedtime as 6:00 PM when I was in first grade. Sunlight poured into my bedroom and I could hear all my friends playing outside. Most of them hadn’t even eaten dinner yet!
My mom had probably read a child-rearing book by some crackpot who declared that kids needed 16 hours of sleep a day. Or maybe, just maybe, with three kids (ages two, four, and six) my mom had had enough of us by the time 6:00 PM rolled around.
You don’t recover from that, let me tell you. What I remember most about Midnight Mass was emitting a series of ungovernable, nonstop yawns and an overwhelming muzziness that never lifted--not even after Mass was over and we walked home in subzero temperatures. I don’t know quite how my mom figured this pre-Mass shut-eye benefited us, but she was, after all, the woman who established my bedtime as 6:00 PM when I was in first grade. Sunlight poured into my bedroom and I could hear all my friends playing outside. Most of them hadn’t even eaten dinner yet!
My mom had probably read a child-rearing book by some crackpot who declared that kids needed 16 hours of sleep a day. Or maybe, just maybe, with three kids (ages two, four, and six) my mom had had enough of us by the time 6:00 PM rolled around.
posted by Rozanne at 6:44 PM
4 Comments:
I'd guess between your theory about the crackpot book and your theory about her need for a nap of her own, the latter theory is closer to the truth...
Well, it was probably about 50-50. My mom was easily influenced by things she read. And I don't remember much napping on her part during the 20+ years she spent raising four children, but then again I have a poor memory. I hope she managed to fit in a few naps!
'In winter I get up at night
and dress by yellow candlelight.
In summer quite the other way
I have to go to bed by day.
Bed In Summer by RL Stevenson
Member that?
~Kismet!
The concept sounds a whole lot more appealing in verse than it actually is in reality!
Being self-employed, I almost never find myself in the "dressing by yellow candlelight," situation, but last week when I had jury duty, I was standing at the bus stop at 7:00 AM marveling at how dark it was and realizing that I had yet another reason to be thankful that I'm not a desk jockey in some office tower somewhere.
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