What I Do While I Sleep ...

I have very little in life to complain about, but I'll have to admit that I don't like this 5:00 a.m. schedule that the Jazzman is currently working. His alarm goes off at 4:08, and then he hits the snooze button and I lie there waiting for it to go off again at 4:15. He then tiptoes around getting ready to leave, leans down and kisses me good-bye around 4:35, then putters around the kitchen until around 4:50. Some Most days I am so completely wide awake, I cannot go back to sleep.

This morning I was awake with a headache at 3:00. My Excedrin finally kicked in around 6:15, and I slept until 7:30. But, oh, did I dream.

I was living in Washington again. My boys were about the current ages of my grandchildren. I decided to go out for a bike ride. But this was my Mother's hand-me-down bike. (Please acknowledge that my mother is 98!! And 8 months!!) (And that I haven't ridden a bike in, oh, 20 years.)

I decided to ride over to a Georgetown neighborhood I knew to find a café for a cup of tea and a pastry. I was balancing a little pillow (of Mother's that currently sits on our couch) to make the bicycle seat more comfortable. I had my iPhone and was carrying a pair of Tyler's outgrown pajamas.

As I was riding along, I couldn't remember where the café was - which way to turn. I stopped by the side of a residential road and —out of the blue — there was my late husband's daughter. She was older-looking (she's 51), heavier and taller (she's 5'2" on a tall day) and with a man I didn't know (prompting me to wonder if she and her saintly husband had separated). I told her my dilemma and she pointed me in the direction I needed to go. After she left, I realized I forgot to ask her if she got the package I sent her at Christmas. (I sent her a video I found of her dad's ski trips to Italy, and she has yet - a month later - to acknowledge receipt!) And then I remembered I meant to give her the pajamas for one of her sons.

I looked on my iPhone at the map app to confirm where I was trying to go, and suddenly my phone was infected with a virus. I was worried about having left the boys alone for so long, but couldn't get the phone to give me a screen to dial out. I realized I needed to get my phone to the Apple store to have someone look at it and clean out the virus.

So I got back on my bike and started rising towards Wisconsin and M to find the Apple store. I took a wrong turn and was lost again. I stopped my bike, walked into a dry cleaner, and asked them where the Apple store was. The man at the counter was on the phone, but a young woman gave me directions.

I got back on my bike and … woke up.

!

Now do you see why I hate going back to sleep after the Jazzman leaves? When I wake up from one of these dreams, I'm exhausted!!