|
 Here
it is in the middle of cabin fever season, and my thoughts are
becoming curious and curiouser. My fear is I become as the winter
caretaker of Overlook Hotel in Stephen King’s book, “The Shining.”
Things are changing within my home.
Where does that lone sock go once I put a matching pair in the
dryer? We have come to accept this happening. But…..if we think
about it…..it becomes eerily spooky. I don’t lose a towel in the
laundry. A pair of jeans has never suddenly vanished from my washing
machine. I haven’t even been flummoxed by a disappearing pair of
underwear. Why is it always a sock?
And….AND…..which one devours the sock…..the washer or the dryer? Or
do socks really have hidden personalities and can’t stand to be
paired up with their matching partner? One runs into oblivion rather
than be compelled to live with its pitiful partner? It’s worthy of a
“Twilight Zone” episode.
What in the world is that irresistible urge to return to the
refrigerator every five minutes to see if any new food has grown in
there? It’s like magnet to steel…. it’s a powerful compulsion to
keep repeating the same impulse of peeking in the fridge. What would
we do if we did look in there…...and, indeed a chocolate cake or a
bottle of Chateau Margaux had materialized? Would we not have a
heart attack? What are we expecting?
I really do not like cleaning house. I adore an orderly home. I just
don’t like the chores it takes to make my domicile sparkle. I do
love to sew, read, cook, tend to my garden, and hang out with my
animals. So, I make it a practice to work for a certain amount of
time and then reward myself by doing something I enjoy. The clock
will slowly churn away the seconds, minutes and hours as I toil away
at scrubbing, vacuuming, straightening up, dusting, etc. That same
clock will spin wildly when I want to read one more chapter or plant
yet another marigold. It is amazing yet a bit frightening to me.
John Lennon, “Time you enjoy wasting is not wasted.”
“The bad news is time flies. The good news is you’re the pilot.”
Micael Altshuler, author.
Then there is that “thing” that you absolutely cannot find. The
worst of the worst is your cell phone when you have shut the ringer
off. You can’t even call it. We strive to relive every second since
we noticed it gone. We open our eyes even wider than usual because
we know that will help. We turn off the TV and radio to see better.
We slow down our gaze to take in one object at a time. We try
terribly hard not to get distracted by other lost objects that we
are now finding. The old saying of “it’s always in the last place
you look” is because you quit looking. But how many times have we
given up searching only to find that sought after object in exactly
the same place we know we already looked….a day later? Eerily
Spooky.
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“My bed is a magical place where I suddenly remember everything I
forgot to do.” Unknown
Why is it that one can be so tired that it is a chore to get ready
for bed, a soothing blessing to finally lay down, your mind then
snaps into overdrive?
“If you could merge two animals together, what animal would you
create? Do mermaids give birth to children or do they lay eggs? If
you could only use three words for the rest of your life, what would
they be and why? Questions don’t have to make sense…but answers do.”
Pinterest.
Where do these thoughts come from? Why do they refuse to go away?
Where did that aura of total fatigue go? What’s with this surge of
adrenaline to solve all the world’s problems? It’s as if my brain
has a mind of its own. Yes. Think about that.
Here’s another spooky question. What in the world makes my dog bark
maniacally at 2 a.m.? Why, when I get up, get cold, check all the
windows and doors, calm my rapidly beating heart…..return to bed and
my Augie Doggie is sound asleep in my little warm nest?
What makes my cat wait until I finally fall asleep and reach that
perfect slumber, deep sleep, Stage 3 NREM, slow wave sleep…..why
then does he choose to pounce upon me and furiously paw at me making
biscuits? His kneading is ferocious and infuriating. It’s cute at 4
p.m. It’s despicable at 4 a.m. His purring could wake the neighbors.
It is as though he is possessed. Yep……spooky.
Why is it that just as you’re about to drift off that you remember
the punch line to the joke you were trying to deliver to your
friends at lunch? I have to wrestle with myself to not get out of
bed and call them. Surely, they are waiting up expectantly at 1 a.m.
to hear the point I was trying to make. Certainly, they like me
cannot sleep until they hear my riveting story. Where do these goofy
thoughts come from and why do they enter one’s head at that specific
time you wish to slumber?
“I want to sleep but my brain won’t stop talking to itself.”
Anonymous
“Happiness is waking up, looking at the clock and finding that you
still have two hours left to sleep.” Charles M. Schulz, American
Cartoonist
The other spooky little mystery is why are we so darn tired when the
alarm goes off? Why are we back in the same motif as when we first
laid our weary head down? Now, once again, we are yearning to sleep.
“In the morning, I woke like a sloth in the fog” Leslie Connor,
author
Let’s go back to the beginning to end this article with a quote from
Stephen King, “It’s the unanswered questions that make it worth
getting up in the morning.”
L. Maxine McQueen may be contacted at
maxmac.1@juno.com |
