Dream alive despite disrupted sleep

I have a dream.

That is, I’d like to have a dream.

I’d like to sleep long enough to actually get to dream.

I’m a night person. I love the soft glow of a star-spattered sky and the deep stillness of midnight. I like to read while my family slumbers.

I probably could even write a book in those rare quiet hours if not for one inescapable thing – morning.

During the uncomfortable sleepless nights of my first pregnancy, I folded tiny baby clothes and stacked diapers while the world around me slept.

When our precious bundle arrived, the midnight feeding was a breeze. I felt wide awake!

Two a.m. wasn’t bad, either. However, by 4 I was miserable. At 6, I told my husband breastfeeding was a horrible mistake. He ignored me.

At 8, I was sure I’d never sleep again.

By the time the baby was 2 weeks old, I realized there must have been a mix-up at the hospital. They gave me a “morning” child.

No child of my womb could be so happy, that early. It’s genetically impossible, I told the pediatrician. He ignored me, too.

In subsequent years I gave birth to three more sons. I was forced to surrender to morning, but I’ve never embraced it.

Unfortunately my children love mornings and still haven’t grasped the concept that I do not.

One Friday, the kids had no school. I informed the children that I would sleep in. I ordered them not to wake me up unless the house was on fire or someone was bleeding.

They solemnly promised to let me sleep. This is what actually happened:

The door quietly opened. Someone tiptoed toward the bed.

“Get out!” I moaned.

“Mom, it’s important!”

“Is the house on fire?” I asked.

“No, but. …”

“Is someone bleeding?” I inquired.

“No but. …”

“Get out!” I yelled.

“But … Ethan’s playing the Nintendo, and it’s not his turn!”

I muffled my screams in my pillow, but before I catch my breath, the door opened again.

“Mom, can I use the computer?”

“No,” I whimpered.

More footsteps padded toward my bed.

“Zack went outside!” someone urgently whispered.

I played dead.

“Sam wants breakfast,” came the next report, before the first informant was out the door.

“I can’t find my socks.”

“Mom, Alex is torturing me!”

“I’m telling!” someone shrieked in the general direction of my head, which was now covered by my pillow, my sheet, my blanket, my quilt and my husband’s pillow.

I knew I was going to have to come up for oxygen soon, but I found an air pocket, and just for a minute or two I pretended not to hear the pandemonium.

As the bedlam escalated, I sneaked a peek at the clock. It was 7 a.m.

Tossing off the covers, I bolted upright. The children were startled into silence by my sudden emergence.

“It’s 7!” I roared. “You guys promised to let me sleep in!”

“You did sleep in!” my firstborn protested. “You usually get up at 6:45.”

I collapsed, too weary to argue with Johnny Cochran Jr.

And then a thought occurred to me – a thought so sweet that in spite of my exhaustion I began to smile.

One day my little boys will be teenagers, and I’ve never heard of a teenager bounding out of bed at the crack of dawn.

Soon, the tables will be turned. I’ll be the one pestering them as they desperately try to sleep.

I snuggle down and pull the blankets around me.

I have a dream.