“Consciousness: That annoying time between naps”

When I was a kid, I totally dreaded Sunday afternoons, because that’s when my parents would nap. I would then be stuck downstairs alone in front of the tv when nothing was on except some lame Burt Reynolds movie. But like an appreciation for good wine and dark chocolate, with age I’ve come to understand…now I know…the nap is a thing of exquisite beauty. I love every part of it, I even love the nap hangover afterwards as long as I don’t have to go anywhere right away. What’s best is when the nap just overtakes you, unplanned. You attempt to put up a fight by telling yourself, “But I could catch up on my tv shows, or write, or read, or work out, or surf the internet,” but your attempts are weak and you know it and so the bed beckons you. You lay down (just for a minute) and somehow, your sheets are perfectly cool and your mattress turns into the world’s most soft, comfortable little slice of heaven you’ve ever experienced. You can barely move. Where at night, you’d toss and turn and spend 30 minutes going over tomorrow’s to-do list, this is a nap and so you’ll wake up in plenty of time to check your email and get ready for the next day. Sleep takes you over with incredible quickness. You lay there, unmoving, with that silly napping smile plastered across your face. When you finally wake up, you allow plenty of wallow-time. In fact, I think 15-30 minutes of after-nap-wallowing should be a requirement. Good stuff, folks. I’ve also always thought a good nap should be shared. You know how you wake up and you’re like “Man, I just had the most amazing nap.” I think maybe its something like watching a hilarious tv episode. It’s just never quite as enjoyable if you’re the only one whose experienced it. I mean, maybe I’m wrong, but I have a fantasy that one day I’ll have the chance to enjoy some seriously amazing couple-naps in the hopefully-not-too-distant future once I meet, seduce, and marry the co-napper of my dreams.