Sleep and Me

I’m not an insomniac. Not really. Oh, there are times when I can’t sleep, usually when I’m upset about something, but it really has to be major to keep me awake. I usually drop off, and drop off early, say around ten.

And then I wake up, of course. Except that’s the problem here—when I wake up. Normally, I wake around five or so. But if I’m unlucky enough to wake earlier, like around four, my ability to go back to sleep depends on whether I happen to think of anything I need to be doing. Like updating my Web site or posting something on the blog or finishing the blurb I really should have written yesterday. At that point I may lie there for another twenty minutes or so, but there’s no way I’ll go back to sleep. I’ve got things to do, and things I’d much rather do than sleep.

I didn’t always have this problem, of course. I can remember as a teenager and then as a college student relishing the ability to sleep in, not getting up until nine or ten. Of course, I also didn’t go to bed until after midnight so I guess it all evens out.

I think my problem here is that I sometimes resent the need to sleep at all. There are so many other things I’d rather be doing. Yeah, I know, rest is important—yadda, yadda, yadda. But just think of all the things you could get done if you didn’t have to allow for that eight-hour stretch of unconsciousness. Sometimes I actually talk myself into sleeping by reminding myself that I’ll be up again soon enough. I’m just not a sleep fan, when you get down to it.

Now the thing that inspired this rant was reading a profile of Delores Del Rio, the silent film star who’s still considered one of the most beautiful women in movies (that’s her picture at the beginning of this post). Supposedly, Del Rio still looked like she was in her thirties when she was actually in her eighties. She claimed her secret was sleep—she slept at least nine hours a night, and sometimes up to sixteen. Do that, she said, and your skin will be like a baby’s.

But I can’t imagine doing that. Sixteen hours? That means you’d only be awake for eight. Take out, say, three hours for meals and you’re down to five. Then you’ve got errands, gym, library, etc., etc., etc. You could very easily end up with only an hour or so to actually get anything interesting done. And then you’d have to go to sleep again. 

Nope. Just nope. Bad enough I have to give up seven hours each night. Not giving up sixteen. So if anyone wonders why my skin isn’t like a baby’s, well, I guess that’s it.

So how do you feel about sleep? Drop off easily? Wake up nice and rested? And does anybody out there really sleep sixteen hours a night?