And I'm Still So Sleepy

At 12:30pm today I was wondering why I felt so unbelievably tired, then I remembered that I'd been slapped awake by good ole insomnia at 2:30am last night. I was awake for about two hours. It's definitely something that happens to me from time to time. Certainly during the last trimester of both pregnancies I would find myself awake for hours at a time during the middle of the night. When I was pregnant with Heath, we still had cable, so I passed the time watching Sex and the City episodes and Movies On-Demand. I have this oddly crystal-clear memory of watching Boogie Nights two nights before Heath was born. I can't think of giving birth to Heath without the scene with the kid lighting the firecrackers in the house, Sister Christian playing loudly, popping into my mind.

With Stella, we no longer had cable, so I got into using a night-reading light. Not too long ago I found Stella watching Sesame Street, munching on the light. I hid it somewhere so she couldn't find it again. I hid it really well. I have no idea where it is.

No cable. No night-light. I find cruising the internet in the middle of the night too nauseating. So what I typically choose to do with my time is worry and fret and obsess. I have no idea exactly what the dire stressors were last night. I'm sure they were the usual suspects. Heath, Stella, Mark-related. And if I managed to solve any crisis last night, I have no recollection of that either. Time well spent.

Today after lunch, I cleared the kitchen table and played "crash" with Heath and Stella. This is a popular game at our house. It includes around 6 Matchbox cars, and crashing. I am usually folding laundry, or preparing a meal, or emptying a dishwasher while this game is being played, but today I joined in. If you are not a participant in this game, it can seem excessively noisy, overtly destructive, and ultimately, disturbing. I've always listened peripherally to Heath's car play. The cars have names, accidents, and dialogue (he always adds, he said, she said, when his cars talk to each other--love it). And it's usually a game I try to discourage, but today I thought, if you can't beat 'em...

Stella had a green Baja Jeep and an Ambulance. Heath had a Prisoner Transport bus and a Sheriff's car. And I had a Medic van and a Sheriff's Crime Technician SUV. If the cars flew off the table, this meant they'd fallen off Trevor's bridge (I have no idea who Trevor is). If they spun around or flipped, this meant they were trapped in a mud hole and needed a tow truck. And if they crashed, well, this meant we screamed with delight and pounded our fists on the table.

Heath did a lot of traffic directing with his Sheriff's car. Something was a bit "off" about the Sheriff. Every time he would wave his right hand and tell a car to move forward, BASH! Another car crash.

Stella zoomed her cars on the table in front of her. When Heath made siren noises, she made siren noises. When Heath said, Beep-beep, she said, Beep-beep. And she did a lot of holding them in her hands, snug to her chest, saying, No, mine. No one was trying to take them. It's just habit.

And I knew the game was over and it was time to move on to something else when the cars started to go airborne--at our heads. Good thing it was nap time. This mama needed a rest.