Sleep. Not as easy a commodity to come by as one might think (since it doesn't cost anything to acquire). According to every researcher, five out of five doctors, and every mother on this planet no one - not a single person - gets enough sleep (including the doctors which is kind of scary when you think about it, especially if they are surgeons). Sleep deprivation is #2 on my list of causation for all evils, sandwiched between #1 (Dehydration) and #3 Ted Turner (but those will subjects for posts at another time).
Frankly I don't know how my daughters do it - both young mothers with two very active boys each. Sleep doesn't come nearly often enough for either of them and yet they are the most wonderful of mothers, wives and daughters.
This leads me to my next rule:
Rule #2: Every hour of sleep you get before midnight counts for two.
(Mr. Donovan, 6th grade math teacher, Meadow Hill School)
Mr. Donovan was a large man, rather intimidating (I don't think that was unintentional on his part). These were still the days of corporal punishment and every kid in that class believed he was definitely capable of inflicting some serious pain if he chose that (perfectly acceptable at the time) course of action. The thing is, I don't ever remember him doing so - not even with the worst screw ups in the class. That which kept us in check was our belief that he could/would resort to that option...just the belief. And that realization meant that we also believed pretty much anything else he told us.
I offer absolutely no empirical data to support this rule (nor did Mr. Donovan - see previous paragraph), however, as a kid, I did always tried to be in bed and asleep - by 10 pm, 10:30 at the very latest - each night. My grades in school were right at or near the top of the class in each subject and I do give at least some credit to this "sleep philosophy" and I remain as faithful to, or at the very least, aware of it, still today.
My day does start early - 4:45 am (on the weekends I'm a slacker and usually sleep in until 5:30 or so - *gasp*). I suppose it wouldn't have to - I mean, I don't usually have anything that absolutely has to get done that early in the day. But I like starting my morning with breakfast with Gerry, over the newspaper with a pot of tea, followed by some computer time and then formulation of at least a plan for dinner (if not that actual prep for it). It's a perfect start to the day and then I'm ready to go tackle a project, an appointment, some sewing. And in my world, if it's going to get done, it's probably going to happen before 1 pm. After that, it's just putting the finishing details on things, puttings things away and then the day picks up speed rolling on into dinner time, evening time (usually spent, I'll admit, watching far too much television) but not on anything substantial as my brain power is too drained to work on anything requiring thought or concentration (learned the hard way of course - never cut out fabric at night!) Bedtime is often ~9:30 pm (which allows for some reading before sleep - otherwise, it's straight to sleep for me). Using Rule #2's formula, that means 2 hours before midnight = 4 hours plus almost five hours after midnight or nearly NINE HOURS of sleep!
I wish I could "bank" some of that to give to my girls!
Now go take a nap!!!
~later, tw
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