Getting the Gum

Originally posted 1/22/09

I just woke up at the 19th hole in the UC with my head in my arms and 23 out of 40 Spanish exercises completed on my laptop. There was a string of drool oozing from my lips through my arms, puddling on the table. It connected my face to the table like the wormholes toward the end of Donnie Darko.
I’m extremely tired.


It’s only the second week and I already have that sick foreboding feeling in my gut that tells me I have taken on too much. It seems like the panic comes earlier and lasts longer every semester.

Last night Ian got out of bed around 10:30 because he wanted a drink of water. He looked like he was wide a wake. He goes to bed at 8:30, but I’m pretty sure he had been awake, playing in bed.


Toward the end of December he stopped taking naps at daycare, and I went round and round with him trying to get him to take a nap. Instead of sleeping he would quietly roll around on his mat until some of the other kids woke up. Finally, we struck a deal. If he takes a nap I give him a huge piece of bubble gum as soon as I pick him up from daycare. He has now been taking a nap everyday for two weeks, and difference in his moods and behavior is like night and day.


Exhaustion is a breeding ground for paranoia, but I’m positive Ian pretends to go to sleep at night and stays up late so that he will be tired enough to fall asleep at naptime. That way he gets the gum.
He’s only four, but I think he might be a shifty little genius.
I wish I had a designated naptime. I guess these days it is whenever I try to do Spanish homework.