Zzzzzzzzzz

I woke up at 5:00 am this morning and was thrilled that I slept so late! My usual wake-up time lately has been 4 if I’m lucky, even earlier if I’m not. Don’t worry, I agree with what you’re thinking—there’s nothing more boring than listening to someone complain about lack of sleep. But in the spirit of my blog-induced self-questioning, I can’t help but wonder if my beliefs about my sleep habits are as shaky as some of the other memories I’ve been revising lately.

In my current version of my sleeping past, I never had any sleep issues until Leah was born in 1994. Up until that time I enjoyed endless nights of deep slumber, waking up after 10 hours of solid sleep, ready to face the world with unlimited vigor.

Is that true? Not likely. If I jiggle the lock on my personal mythology, alternative images start to come into focus. In my first seven years of life, we lived in a small two-bedroom apartment on St. Louis Avenue in Chicago. My brother and sister and I slept in three twin beds that were lined up against the wall. Although it was often hard to fall asleep with their constant chatter, I was even more distracted by another family member: on the far side of the room was our 1962 Philco 23-inch television console, encased in luscious blond wood and as big as a home freezer. I remember eating many meals on a TV tray in front of that set, never releasing my hypnotic gaze from first-run episodes of shows such as “My Favorite Martian” “Mr. Ed,” or “Petticoat Junction” (the black and white years). I would have watched that set all night long if I didn't have to sleep, the actual programming didn’t matter that much. I would have been just as transfixed watching Buddy Hackett and Oscar Levant sparring on the Jack Paar Show as I was watching Samantha Stevens twitching her nose under the disapproving glare of her husband Darrin. When my mother insisted on turning off the set, I’d watch that long-lingering white dot in the lower center of the screen, glum with the knowledge that it would soon disappear and leave me all alone. To placate my media addiction, my mother would put LPs on the scratchy RCA record player in our bedroom as she turned the lights out. We might fall asleep listening to Gordon MacRae warn Shirley Jones that “People Will Say We’re in Love,” Julie Andrews imploring her young charges to take “Just a Spoonful of Sugar,” or the Chinatown cast of “Flower Drum Song” warbling that “Living Here Is Kind of Like Chop Suey.” But by far our most frequent nighttime lullaby was the soundtrack for “The Wizard of Oz.” Our deluxe long-playing album included a good portion of the dialogue from the film. I remember falling asleep many times listening to the Wicked Witch’s screeching rages. “Ring around the rosey, pocketful of spears. How about a little fire, Scarecrow?” “Going so soon? I wouldn’t hear of it. Why, my little party is just beginning!” “It’s true I can’t attend to you here and now as I’d like, but I’ll get you my pretty—AND YOUR LITTLE DOG TOO!” Nothing like the dulcet tones of Margaret Hamilton’s death threats to lull a young boy to sleep!

When we moved to our larger home on Drake Avenue, we each had our own bedroom. I could see the driveway from my window and I remember staring out at the empty cement patch waiting for my parents to come home from their frequent nighttime outings. I don’t know why it wasn’t enough to know that our babysitter was sitting in my parents’ bedroom watching Johnny Carson, I just didn’t feel safe until I saw that black Cadillac pull into the garage. Once they were home, I fell asleep even before they completed the 30-second walk from the garage to the house. One some nights I’d sneak a flashlight under my covers and read Archie comic books for hours on end. Later on, when I had a very small black and white Sony TV on my dresser I would bring the whole set under the bedspread, radiation seeping into my eyes that were only two inches from the TV as I watched “Mission: Impossible,” “Mannix, ” Hawaii 5-0,” or some other inappropriate bedtime viewing that only upped my adrenaline.

These were also the years when my sister perfected her ability to induce night terrors. She would sweetly say good-night to me and then turn my light out as she shut the door behind her. Ah, but did she really leave the room? Many times she would just crouch down on the floor, pretending that she left, and wait a good 10 minutes in the pitch dark before slowly advancing towards my bed, a Frankenstein-like moan growing in intensity as I lay convinced I was about to be slaughtered by a rabid monster. One by-product of this psychological warfare was my growing fear that she was still in the room even when she was nowhere in sight. After tossing and turning and calling out her name, I’d have no choice but to get out of bed and make a mad dash for the lights so I could check every nook and cranny of the room, only to find it as empty as can be.

Delving even deeper into my sleep memories, I remember some borderline OCD rituals that I had to perform before I allowed myself to get into bed. Must place bathroom mat exactly in center of floor tile design. Must touch curtain on the landing as I go up the stairs. Must open and shut laundry chute before I enter bedroom.

Despite all this nighttime angst, I don’t remember being particularly sleep deprived back then. Once asleep, I rarely woke up during the night. I even remember making a deal with my friends during our off-school periods that we wouldn’t call each other before 10:30 am so we wouldn’t wake each other up. 10:30? My God, these days it would take a barbiturate overdose or a full-fledged coma to keep me asleep until that hour!

As far as my early rising tendencies, I suppose I do trace those to Leah’s birth. Not that I blame her for it. Sure, there were the four months of sleep deprivation that any newborn brings about, and I remember nights of creating an indentation in the living room floor as I marched Leah endlessly back and forth trying to calm her down with Rodgers and Hammerstein tunes (at least I wasn’t doing my trademark Margaret Hamilton imitation), but after those early months she always slept through the night and she is still a great sleeper (knock on wood—or my iBook’s industrial-grade plastic). But something shifted in me after I became a parent. In addition to my desire to check on my daughter every 20 minutes to make sure she was still alive, I was concerned by my ex-wife Sophie’s rock solid sleeping habits. What if Leah were to call out during the night and Sophie slept through it? I trained myself to wake up at the slightest sound—say, for example, the crashing din of a maple leaf floating to the ground. The only problem was that Leah never did call out to us during the night and yet my ears soon became as highly trained as a sonar listening device. And now Kendall’s sleeping abilities dwarf even Sophie’s. If left to her own devices, I truly believe that Kendall might sleep for days at a time, waking up only to change her Venti Starbucks IV drip. Knowing that my wife could sleep through an 8.0 earthquake, a raging house fire, or a nuclear holocaust, I have developed my sensitivity to sound to the point where I can hear the cry of an infant in a neighboring county.

Does it sound like I’m blaming everyone else for my own neuroses? My sister-in-law Brooke, who is a therapist, is convinced that I can completely control my sleep patterns through a rigid series of forced bedtimes, alarm clocks, breathing exercises, and willpower. I’m sure she’s right but I’m almost as scared of her regime as I am of sleep deprivation. The secret truth is that part of me loves those very early hours of the day. I used to think of 5:30 am as the magic moment: if I woke up at 5:29 I’d be miserable and exhausted for the entire day, but if I woke up at 5:31 I’d be fresh as a daisy and full of energy. That magic time has now inched up to 4:00 am. I realize much of this is in my head and I’m not against tricking myself with the clock. Remember that great “Dick Van Dyke Show” episode when Rob wakes up on a Saturday morning dead to the world and begs Laura to set the alarm for two hours later so he can catch up on his sleep? She does but at the same time she changes the time on the clock to two hours later. Seconds after waking up unable to move, Rob now bounds out of bed, convinced he’s had that extra two hours of sleep, and starts doing jumping jacks.

Maybe this is a case of “if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it.” Not everyone needs 8 hours of sleep, right? And if I slept longer how could I smugly rattle off to Kendall my full day’s worth of activities I’ve already completed as she drifts awake at 2:00 pm? I guess I just need to stop kvetching about how early I wake up, thus forcing people to try to “cure” me. Besides, if I didn’t wake up at 4 in the morning, when the hell would I write in my blog?

Comments

[toni spencer]

Dear Danny,
Thank you for such a hysterical piece, and as one who has not had a good night sleep since Morgan's arrival I can truly sympathise, however I do have one question - how can you write about not sleeping and not mention the A word? Or am I the only one that believe that, besides the challenges of sleeping near/within the vicinity of a baby/toddler, it is the encroachment of age and its multiple horrors that is causing this sleeplessness ~ or are you that much younger then me??
best,
toni

[Danny]

Oy, good point, Toni. And I'm thinking of having another child at my advanced age? Am I INSANE??

[Tamar]

You are not insane...lack of sleep makes us a teeny bit neurotic, wouldn't you say?

(Note that I say "us"!)

But, for me dawn is the best hour of the day - I wouldn't miss it for the world! My favorite line in Kate Wolf's song The Great Divide is:

"The finest hour that I have seen,
is the one that comes between,
the edge of night,
and the break of day,
that's when the darkness rolls away."

[Lisa]

Danny, I simply call it being a morning person, my dear. And let everyone else "worry" about it. For me, it's probably left-over from Yankee/Canadian bloodstock. Enjoy it, be proud! Dwelling as I do with sundry science fiction witer types, I am in the minority, but, hey, the early bird gets the better pastries, yes?

[Your Brother Bruce]

Danny, what does it mean if as I grab my coffee and sit down to read today's blog entry the Golden Girls comes on the Lifetime Network with an episode about Blanche's sleep deprivation.

But I digress. My most powerful memory of our shared youth as it relates to sleeping is when I caught Mom changing the only clock in the apartmnt other than her and Dad's alarm clock. Do you remember the clock in he face of half a teapot that was in a special shelf about 2 feet below the ceiling on the wall in the kitchen?

She advanced the clock an hour to get us into bed earlier. I was suspicious, but checked the clock and agreed to go to bed. The jig was up for her when I heard the Dobie Gillis ( a show on before our bed time) theme song coming from Mom and Dad's bedrom.

Needless to say I tortured her with this story for the rest of her life!

[Brooke]

I love your blog, Danny, however I fear I sound like the most unempathetic therapist on earth. Please note all sleeping suggestios were delivered with deep compassion and unconditional positive regard, etc, etc... Best, Brooke
P.S. Dawn is overated! You could try valium!

[Elaine Soloway]

Danny, as another early morning riser (4 a.m. is typical, 5 would be a mechaye), I must submit the downside of our predawn awakenings: we make lousy evening companions.

Çurrently, my head starts bobbing at 8:00 p.m., and photographs taken of me at weddings and bar mitzvahs, show me elbow on table, head in hand, eyes closed.

At Roosevelt High School in the 1950s, I was a poor date. I can remember Jay Andres on WGN Radio. It was his “Music ‘til Dawn,” which lulled me into dreamland. If the adolescent at the wheel had any romantic plans, they were quickly doused at the sight of his dozing date.

Love, Elaine