Alarm Clock

You would think that after nearly ten months with me he would know that sleep, to me, is sacred.

I will accept equal guilt in staying up after midnight, telling secrets and giggling. But this morning may be unforgivable.

First, his cell phone alarm went off an entire hour before mine was set to wake me. (queue birds chirping, the sun shining, me muttering curses under my breath.) But the cell phone alarm doesn't wake him up, does it? No. It wakes me up. In blind confusion. Hitting the snooze button on my clock radio. Which turns it ON. It takes me a few seconds to realize that the cell phone is still humming, and now the radio is on too. So I shove him. He hits the snooze on his phone and I fumble to reset my alarm. He goes back to sleep.

All this commotion wakes up the incontinent dog.

I manage to drift back to half-sleep after he gets up to let the dog out and take a shower. But then there he is again. Digging through his clothes, getting dressed.

Coughing.

Coughing in that very specific way that sounds like "Ahem. aHEM. AHEM!" Like he's trying to wake me up.

Then he settles into the armchair by the bed with his computer. AHEM.
"Are you sick, baby?"
"Just this nagging cough."
"I'll say."

And there he sits aheming away, checking his email. And no amount of my groaning and tossing and turning is giving him the hint that it would be really nice if I could could just get twenty more minutes of sleep before my alarm goes off.

And then. And then. He puts his earbuds in and blasts Wu Tang Clan from his computer. So loud that I can hear it across the room from under a pillow.

So I make it to work with enough caffeine to keep at least half-awake till lunch. And I debate all day; should I try to take a walk on my lunch break, or surrender to the back seat of my car for a nap? I can barely keep my eyes open and the nap is calling to me, but I know myself well enough to know that it will be nearly impossible to wake up and function again after a sweaty afternoon car nap.

So I walk. It should wake me up, get the blood pumping. Endorphins and all that crap. But every ten steps the lush green grass along the neatly paved walking paths calls out me. I'm listening to a book on my ipod, drinking a diet coke as big as my head, and power walking through the office park and all I can think about is curling up in a ball in the soft green manicured grass and taking a long, long nap.

I will go home tonight, and tell him about my day, about my walk, about my napping in the grass fantasy. I will make him tea for his cough. And we will stay up past midnight telling secrets and giggling.