Wednesday, January 22, 2020

A World-Class Napper

A good friend of mine possesses a skill that I envy very much. He has the ability to take a nap at any time and in any place. For example, we’ll be at a party, with loud conversations going on all around, plus a gaggle of kids running through the house squealing. My friend will sit on the couch, amidst all that noise, and tilt his head back slightly. Within 30 seconds he will be snoring. After a 10- or 15-minute power nap, he’ll be refreshed and ready to go for the rest of the day.
 
I am so jealous. Virtually every single day, I get bleary-eyed about mid-afternoon. A 15-minute nap would be perfect. But I only can fall asleep if certain conditions are met. First, I have to be lying down flat. Tilting my head back while sitting, even on a comfortable chair, will not work. Next, the room has to be dark. It doesn’t have to be pitch black, but if the lights are on, I won’t doze off no matter how tired I am. Finally, and here’s the reason I nap so rarely, the room must be quiet. And I don’t mean a muffled roar in the background. I mean silent, as in zero decibels.

If I’m in the process of drifting off to sleep and I hear a shrill sound — “shrill sound” being defined as anything noisier than, say, a butterfly flapping its wings — I will startle awake, and the surge of adrenaline that always occurs will guarantee that I won’t be able to fall asleep for at least the next three hours.

The only time I take naps is on the weekend. I go into the bedroom, turn off the lights, get under the covers, and hope to snooze for 10 or 20 minutes. Most of the time, however, I don’t fall asleep, usually because of some “shrill sound,” like an earthworm making a racket outside the bedroom window or a bird chirping in the neighboring town.
 
In case you’re wondering, my super-napper friend does not have narcolepsy. That unfortunate medical condition causes people to fall asleep suddenly during the day against their will. I know my friend does not suffer from this malady because recently he gave me a ride home late at night. (At our age, “late at night” means any time after 9:30 p.m.) During the entire journey home, he was wide awake.

I’m not going to say that I wasn’t a little nervous during that ride. After all, I am fully aware that he is capable of tilting his head back and being sound asleep within seconds. During the whole trip, I had my hands poised, ready to lunge to the left and grab the steering wheel. But there was no problem at all.
 
The bottom line is: my friend has an amazing skill. He can stay awake when he needs to be awake, and when the time is right for a nap, he can fall asleep instantly. As I said earlier, I am so jealous.

You might think it’s kind of silly to devote an entire newspaper column to the subject of napping. If so, I have one question for you: where have you been the past two decades? Every week this column focuses on something silly.

Also, if you think the topic of napping is silly, then you must be a young whipper-snappers, someone under the age of 55. For those of us who are, um, mature, we understand that a good nap is one of the joys of life. In fact, it’s now time for me to try to doze off. I hope the butterflies and earthworms shut up for a change.

No comments:

Post a Comment