2/8/2011 - the idée fixe I helplessly turned over and over. . .

Mid-day naps are a luxury I usually do not get. 

If I need one, I am undoubtedly at work.  I would hit my 3:45 wall where I start falling into a food coma, the kind where my eyes cross every time I blink, and all I want to do is just crawl under my desk for five (glorious!) minutes, close my eyes and just revel in the feeling of them being closed.  Of course, I don't do that, so I go without the nap. 

When I have the opportunity to sleep during the day, such as on Saturdays when the couch is empty and inviting, I don't feel a need.  Suddenly, I can eat a 12-ounce filet for lunch, and food coma is a thing of the past.  I would never think to sleep away a precious afternoon when I am not at work.  So again, I go without the nap.

Bottom line is that on most days, I wake up in the morning and go to bed at night, and my head does not hit a pillow in between.

I think of this because when I got home from work this afternoon, I actually still wanted to take that nap I needed an hour earlier; the allure of all that 'home' had to offer was not enough to shake me from my lethargy.  And with Sam gone, my after-work schedule was wide, wide open.  So I came home, changed out of my work clothes, and settled down on the couch, one pillow behind my neck and the other on my chest.  I hugged that one tight, curled up in a slight fetal position (which is my absolute favorite position to sleep in), and listened to the traffic sounds outside, felt the air move about the room.  I thought about work the next day, what time Sam would be home tonight, what to have for dinner.  

Eventually, I started thinking less.  Traffic got quieter, and I felt less the air and more the couch, the mold of it to me and how if I stayed still, I could not honestly tell where my body ended and the leather began.

I had one last thought before I faded into sleep, the one I obsessed about, the idée fixe I helplessly turned over and over in my head like the theme in Ravel's "Bolero."  It was as though my brain hit a scratch on its surface, causing the needle to play back the same two seconds of the song ad nauseum.  Then I fell asleep.  

I fought hard to remember what that thought was when I awoke 40 minutes later.  Nothing.  I can't recall, and because I can't recall, it has become the thought of the century.  I'm sure it was the most profound one I had and would ever have, and I trust that the needle found its way out of the irregularity, played the song through, resolved the conflict, saved the world.  

Naps can do that, I guess.  It certainly saved me from a very possible day of 'blog failure,' as I had come home with no idea what I could write about.

Yet here it is.