Learn from yesterday, live for today, look to tomorrow, rest this afternoon.
-Charles Schulz
I usually take a two-hour nap, from one to four.
-Yogi Berra
Don’t bother me, Imma take a nap now.
-She’s a Maineiac
Let’s face it, life is full of stress. There are very few moments in the average day when you can contentedly sit back and say, “Yeah, this is the stuff. Life can’t get much better than this. I’m happy. I’m good.”
Except for the rare time when the planets align and the thought hits: You could be taking a nap right now. After all, no one’s around. It’s quiet. You have no place to be. And your favorite blankie is fresh out of the dryer all steamy-hot goodness, just begging to be snuggled with during a restorative afternoon siesta.
Good satisfying naps are precious, they need to be savored. But the best naps are elusive because they easily throw your body’s inner clock for a loop. You have to be careful you don’t sleep too much. I did that once, woke up and thought it was the year 2078. At the same time, they need to be long enough so you don’t wake up more tired and groggy than before the nap. Once I slept for three minutes, woke up and thought it was 1978 again. It’s a delicate balance of time.
The worst is when you wake up and it’s pitch dark. For some odd reason if this happens to me I lose all sense of my identity, place or time in history. I immediately think, Holy hell! Did I sleep all day and into tomorrow night? Or maybe I slept for an entire year and missed out on the season finale of The Good Wife?
Sometimes I’ll awaken to the faint sounds of my kids clanging around in the other room and I’ll think, Who the devil is making those noises? I have kids? For these times, it helps if you sleep with your teddy bear for that extra comforting when you honestly don’t know what day it is or who you are anymore.
When the chance for a nap strikes, don’t hesitate. This opportunity happens to me only once every five years or so.
Yesterday was one of those days. I had just finished eating a satisfying lunch, sat down on the couch and suddenly my eyes grew heavy. I said to my husband, “You know what? I’m gonna take a nap. Don’t bother me for thirty minutes or I’ll kill you.”
Then I hightailed it for the bedroom, locked the door behind me and jumped into our king-sized bed, all giddy with anticipation. There’s something so deliciously evil about taking naps. It’s like you’re saying to the world, “You know what? Screw you. I’ve had enough.”
And this nap was brilliant. My pillow was perfectly fluffed. The sun cast a warm beam of light across the bed. I laid my weary head down and fell swiftly into the first stage of sleep, strange images of Eminem* sitting on my living room couch and eating a mountain of popcorn drifting though my subconscious. Oh yeah, I like popcorn too, Eminem…..yeah…..I’d also like to try that giant strawberry swirling around your head….sooooo goooood….okay, now your entire head is the strawberry? Fine, I’ll still eat it…..Then I was completely gone. Deep sleep. I knew I was drooling all over my pillow and didn’t care. I felt the cool puddle against my cheek and still continued to eat popcorn and strawberries with Eminem, world be damned. Because that’s when you’re truly living. That’s when the magic happens.
You know what? I’ll stop writing here. I think I’ll go take another nap now.
*this was the actual dream I had, don’t judge. If anyone knows what the symbols popcorn and strawberries mean in a dream, let me know. If anyone knows why the hell I dreamt of Eminem, let me know.
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She's A Maineiac 
Reblogged this on ugiridharaprasad.
Deliciously evil. Yup. That’s what taking a nap is all about!
There are so few things in my life that I do that are evil, Elyse, let alone deliciously evil. I figure I am owed hundreds of naps at this point.
Sadly, I don’t think we get to take them until we’re too old to remember how deliciously evil they are!
oh man! i never never nap. even when my kids were babies and i should have, i didn’t. but there’s always that moments, generally around 3 or so and my kid wants me to battle dragons or some nonsense and i sit on the carpet while he explains the ‘rules’ of the game and i just want to fall over. it’s actual torture to stay up. i kind of feel that way when my husband drags me to home depot as well. next time i’m gonna give in. although i’d like my dream to have ice cream and maybe justin timberlake. good night.
You never nap?! I used to nap quite a bit when I was pregnant. Even when I was pregnant and had my four year old son at home. Some of my fondest memories were the two of us snuggled up on the couch, my son all cozied up next to my giant belly.
As for Home Depot holy snoozefest. Yeah, the second I enter that store and my husband drags me down the nuts and bolts aisle, my eyes glaze over and I am checked out.
May I suggest you go to Home Depot today then you will have sexy dreams of eating strawberries with JT later on…
Oh yes yes yes, I LOVE naps! My ideal pattern is to wake up early, go to bed late and have a nice long afternoon nap, I would do that every day if I could, unfortunately life doesn’t allow for that. However, with my current studying, I work four days a week rather than five, so on that one day a week which is my study day, I have now got into the pattern of getting up very early to start studying (because that’s my best time for studying), and then allowing myself an afternoon nap before the kids get home from school and it’s bliss! The desire for a nap is there even if I haven’t got up early, but the getting up early ensures I stil get enough productive study time in. Now that my kids are older and often out doing their own thing on weekends, I can sometimes even get a weekend nap in. Fantastic.
If only I could sleep with my eyes wide open, then I could take a nap during my insurance coding class lecture. I’m certain if I slept with my coding textbook underneath my head, I’d learn all that boring information through osmosis, right?
Yes, that’s why you often see people asleep outside with an open book on their face – they are resting, getting some fresh air, and absorbing information all at the same time.
I am now a huge fan of naps since I bought my new corner chaise sofa, it is custom made for napping, have my cushions and throw and of a Saturday afternoon after I’ve done all my chores and been out and about, I bed down – it’s great. To think I survived with my old sofa for 5 years, this was the best thing I ever bought. My cat joins me too so we both wake up bleary eyed and ponder dinner.
Oh, that is heaven! Waking up bleary-eyed with your cat from a cozy couch nap….sigh….what’s funny is I find our couch to be much more comfortable than our king-sized bed. Sometimes my husband snores so dang loud I happily sleep out in the living room.
I’ll raise your King Size with my Super Kingsize. But actually I think our sizes work differently, much like shoe sizes. So your Kingsize is probably bigger than our SuperKing!
I don’t know why we have floorspace in bedrooms, should just open door and giant bed touching every wall
Too funny, Darla, as usual. Hadn’t thought about it until you mentioned it, but, yes, waking up from an afternoon nap when it’s dark is totally disorienting. I LOVE to nap–even if I do wake up thinking it’s 2078.
Hugs from Ecuador,
Kathy
The older I get, the less I can remember who the hell I really am when I wake up from either a nap or a good night’s sleep.
There’s not much sweeter than a good nap!
And if it’s just the right length of time, you wake up feeling like you could take on the world.
Timing is everything. Sometimes I take a nap and I sleep too long and feel pulverized — logy and out of sorts. Most times, it’s incredibly refreshing.
yes, I think it shouldn’t be more than 20 minutes. At least when I sleep 20 minutes, that is the perfect amount.
I set my phone alarm for 20 mins which seems to be the ideal. Recently I took a nap and it took me for over 2 hours. When I woke up I felt beyond grumpy. Never heard the alarm go off. I think it was a case of SADD. But, I guess that hibernating in this weather is better than boozing….
There’s no one who deserves a good nap more than you, DP, not even Eminem! But seriously, he needs to keep walking so you have room to dream about Justin Timberlake. Plus it sounds like he ate all of your popcorn, and that is just not cool.
I suck at napping; never get the timing right, and wind up more sleepy, so I don’t bother. Instead I get cranky and take it out on everyone around me. 😉
I know! Why, Eminem? Why not JT? I have to tell you I was awoken this morning from the best most sexy dream I’ve had in awhile — Brad Pitt (from his younger Ocean’s 11 days) was helping me study for a big medical exam. He was wearing these glasses and took them off and said to me, “I can’t study because you’re just too damn sexy, girl.” Yowza! Then, um…well, I won’t go into the rest of the dream here because this is a damned “family blog”. Why do I have to be a family blog, JD? Why??
Sounds like a delightful dream.
It really was surprisingly delightful. Eminem was such a gentleman, letting me snack on his mutant strawberry head and all. I’m certain Freud would have a field day with this dream.
Perhaps you were eating or craving M&M’s, and your dream got confused.
I love naps. The best naps for me are on the couch while “watching” TV. When I wake up and move my ass to bed, it’s never the same.
ah, that’s it! Yes, popcorn and M&Ms! I also saw on the news today something about Eminem headlining a Lollapalooza concert so maybe it was one of those prophetic dreams. If his head turns into a strawberry later today I will be totally creeped out.
zzzzzzzzzzzzz…..zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz……zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz……
Well said.
zzzzzzz……zzzzzzz…..zzzzz
I find it mindblowing that my kids are anti-nap. They couldn’t wait to stop napping. Even now, though, I will find them zonked out in the back seat on a long drive because they are tired, but they will never admit that they slept. Whereas I would shout it from the rooftops. “I napped! It was sinful and delicious! Now I can tackle the world!!!” Ok, maybe not that last part.
In the winter, I routinely fall asleep while watching football. I love and understand football, and am always rooting for my Ravens, but something about the soothing sounds of the announcers and the 3 hour long game makes me VERY sleepy. Ah, football naps are the best!
“football naps are the best!”
Agreed. 🙂
Yes, I’m with you. I love football so much, but there is something magically comforting about the sounds of a game in the background. Reminds me of my childhood I guess.
You’re getting confused, Darla. It’s supposed to be REM sleep, not MNM.
Glad you had a refreshing, fluffy-pillowed nap. I don’t nap. Even when the babies were little and I had next to zero sleep at night, I could not force myself to lie down in the middle of the day. Only when I’m sick, and even then I don’t like to burn daylight.
What?? Get out! Because you don’t like to nap? Or you can’t physically take a nap? I am blown away by this. Maybe I love naps because I come from a long line of nappers in my family. My mother takes a nap every day like clockwork from 1 to 3 pm. I’m sure I’ll be doing the same when I’m her age.
I am an expert at the 20-minute power nap. Gives me just enough energy to get up and make dinner…
Power naps are the best. I woke up from this last nap and was bouncing all around the room, really ticking off my grumpy kids and husband.
Well, now, there’s a good reason to nap! 😉
I love naps! When my kids were little, I used to take one when they did. 🙂 Why not? It was pure survival instinct. What a great description of your naps. I can definitely relate to the confusion upon waking. However, it’s a bit different for me as I’ve moved so much, that sometimes when I fit in a nap I’ll wake up and have no idea where I am! Not so much when, like you, but the where might be just as freaky. Especially if I’m groggy, and my brain has to cycle between the last three or four places I’ve lived before I figure it out!
Oh, I’ve done that before, you wake up and you don’t realize what house you’re in. Very unnerving. What I find really cool about naps are the vivid dreams I manage to have in such a short amount of time. I think my brain is so stressed and zapped lately it needed a break. I wish I could take a nap every single day.
More than dreaming about popcorn, strawberries and Eminem, I want to know what eating his strawberry head meant! LOL! Love naps. Need more of them. Every. Single. Week. XOXO-Kasey
I know, eating his giant strawberry head has got to mean something and frankly, I’m not sure I want to know what.
Ha, ha….no doubt!
I never ever nap. Regardless of whether my naps are 3 minutes or 3 hours, I spend the night after a nap tossing and turning and getting nearly no sleep (as opposed to the usual 90 minutes of quality sleep I usually get nightly). My wife, on the other hand, is a world class napper. She hails from a long line of nappers. They’ve been known to base sofa purchase decisions not so much on decor but on nap-ability.
As for the symbolism of your dreams, let’s see: You were eating juicy red, heart-shaped morsels of sweetness, then you were eating salty, crunchy savory kernels of exploded fiber-filled goodness, all the while hanging out with Marshall Mathers….hmmm…You were craving Chocolate covered peanuts in a candy shell. Sheesh, you chicks and your chocolate!
Yes, your wife and I must have some kind of genetic tendency to nap because my mother naps, my grandmother used to nap….while my husband can barely sleep at night let alone nap. I don’t think he’s ever had a nap in his entire life. This blows my mind because I live for sleep.
Hated naps as a kid. Now? Pleeeeease.. let me fall asleeeeeeeep…
I can’t do planned naps, though. I can’t tell myself, “And now I shall take a nap.” It has to be spontaneous. Which is probably less of a nap and more of a falling into some drooling stupor because I’m aging.
Oh yeah, it has to be a spur of the moment thing. The last one I had was so out of the blue, the thought just struck me, “I need a nap NOW” and off I went. This rarely happens to me. Once every five years or so if I’m lucky.
Naps are the best. Sometimes Reggie and I get a nap on a Sunday afternoon. Reggie will have crazy doggie dreams where he’s growling and “running” in place on his dog bed. Once he even barked. I think he’s trying to get the strawberries and popcorn back from Eminem.
Oh! There is nothing better than snuggling up with your dog. As a kid I used to sleep with my dog Princess and she’d lay on top of my legs, very comforting. So cute when they run in their sleep.
Perfect nap, I’ve heard, is 25 minutes. I don’t know if that’s true. With three little ones running about, I haven’t napped in years. Sigh.
Yes, for me it’s about 20 to 25 minutes tops. If it’s 30 minutes of more, I wake up cranky as hell. I had no idea you had three hellions. My son napped until he was six. My daughter gave up naps at the age of 2. So it’s been years for me too.
Yup, youngest is 1.5 years, oldest is 7, and it’s a zoo around here. I don’t know how anything gets done.
One day, we will nap again. One day.
Nappy time. Precious.
lolol….I dreamt of LLCool J…. we jus weird like that
Ah, I would much rather dream of LL Cool J!
Oh I love those naps, drooling on the pillow, icky maybe, but it’s the sign of a well needed deep sleep, no matter how short, actually they only happen to me on this quicky afternoon naps. And waking up when it’s suddenly dark, yup, scares the hell out of you for a minute before you get your bearings… “What’s day is it again..? Bugger, it’s still today”
I don’t think I’ve ever drooled from sleep in my entire life until last weekend. Must be a strange side effect of getting older.
Definitely — ALWAYS take your teddy to bed with you…
🙂
I’m jealous. Popcorn and strawberries? My dreams have been horrifying lately. I need to stop watching The Following, Dexter, and The Walking Dead right before bed because they are meshing with my sleep patterns. Or weirdest one yet, since I’m wedding planning, they start to mash up. So I had a dream that I was on route to kill a guy who was at this wedding reception, and I stopped to take notes of what I liked and didn’t like at their party first. *shakes head in confusion*
Napping is one of the great joys in life that we don’t truly appreciate until we’re older, like sitting down. When I worked retail (standing all day), I’d see little kids fighting to get out of strollers, and I wanted to say, “No, stay there! You’re allowed to sit as much as you want – make the most of it, my young friend.” Youth truly is wasted on the young. Also, check out this handy napping chart. Who knew there were so many kinds of naps?
http://lifehacker.com/how-long-to-nap-for-the-biggest-brain-benefits-1251546669
Right now naps seem to feed my sense of loss. I don’t like them. I use to love them, they seem decadent and wonderful, but now? Meh.
I want naps to be wonderful again.
I have awoke from a nap in the dark and wondered “Is it 7:30 p.m. or a.m.?” Disturbing feeling. Naps are wonderful, but even better if they don’t include Eminem. Yes, he’s talented … but, “hey, hey, get offa my cloud.” 😉
When I worked as a temp, I awoke and heard someone typing on my typewriter (this was a l-o-n-g time ago) in the living room. If I wasn’t groggy, I would have quickly determined that no one breaks into your home to write random notes on your typewriter.
I think that eating Eminem’s strawberry head means that he is your secret admirer and that he secretly wants to whisk you away.
That, or you think that strawberry M&Ms would be really good.