Grandma Henke

 Why do kids whisper to you when you are taking a nap?     Do they think you can answer without waking up?     If they knock softly on the bedroom door is that so you can stay asleep?          We have three grandchildren who live with us, ages 7, 8, and 12 who have yet to learn the sacredness of sleep.    It isn’t a challenge for them yet.    Steele, thinks it’s a waste of time and Chloe, thinks it is boring.    

This is what is whispered from the doorway of my bedroom:  ”Grandma, I’m hungry.”  (How can you be?)  ”Grandma, do you know where the phone is?”  (I haven’t seen it since Kati turned 12.)   “Grandma, are you awake?”   ( I always drool on my pillow when I’m awake)  ”Grandma, there’s no milk in the fridge?”  (That’s because no one ever puts it away.)  Grandma, do you know where Grandpa is, my batteries are dead.”    (No, apparently he has a better hiding place than I do.)   Your brain is desperately telling your brain to stay asleep … darn it, that must mean it’s  already awake. 

When my kids were little they learned not to disturb my slumber but it was different for them because I wasn’t as nice then as I am now (at least that’s what they tell their children) so they were afraid of me.     They didn’t want to wake me up!    Back then what would wake me up instantly was a muffled whisper from three rooms away, saying “Don’t wake up Mom.”    I’d be up and out of bed and alert in an instant!     My children might think I was meaner … but they were … sneakier.   That’s the biggest difference between mothering and grandmothering … the subjects are not as sneaky.

As irritating as whispering is to slumber,  shrill screaming is worse.    Most of my grandchildren have at one time or another perfected a very blood curdling scream that starts on high C and crescendos to an even higher and louder C … and it has no definitive meaning.   It can be anything from ”I just cut off three fingers” to “Somebody touched  me” or even worse … “looked at me”.     Do you remember what happens to your heart and lungs and bowels when you are awaked like that?    It’s ugly is what it is … especially if nothing is the matter.   One time I frantically ran to the family room to find Chloe sitting peacefully on the couch after being coached by her older sister to scream.     It’s a lot easier to deal with a true crisis when your adrenaline is off the scale than it is to have nothing be the matter.   

After so many of these rude awakenings, my subconscious has been put on high and sleep no longer comes easy for me.   I’m not like the villagers in ”The Boy Who Called Wolf” … I have to react every time because I have heard the ending to the story.   What if THIS time it’s for real?  

I thought maybe the perspective on sleep changed naturally as a person ages, but it isn’t  that.   Lynn is older than I am and he can sleep in any position at any time … particularly sitting straight up in church.  I’ve seen him sing himself to sleep during the sacrament hymn and I don’t know how many times he’s done it mid-sentence if we are talking in bed.   He can sleep with his eyes open or closed.   How about this picture of himsleeping in the Las Vegas airport …  My man doesn’t even have to be in a comfortable position!    His head doesn’t have time to touch the pillow before his breathing changes and he starts making  noises through his nose.   (Try to get to sleep after that.)   I don’t think we were created equal at all because I can talk to him when he’s asleep and he can answer me and not wake up.    He can sleep through two children crawling into our queen sized bed who lay crossways between us and dream of riding their bikes.     And guess which one of us wakes up happy?  

This blog is getting out of hand … the topic is too controversial for my mind to handle and it is too close to bed time to risk it.      Goodnight. 

Technorati Tags: Sleep, Lack of Sleep, The Boy Who Called Wolf