A Bit Unusual

Written by Ruby A. Iadeluca

It's Sunday evening, and currently I am sitting here all by my lonesome. The two younger kids are in bed - and asleep. The older two kids and their dad are still at work.

I can hear my last load of laundry for the day going its' rounds in the dryer. I have already put away all of the clean and folded laundry. I am showered and pajama-ed and have put a fresh coat of polish on my nails. I've checked Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest and several of my favorite sites and blogs.

And now.... ? I'm thinking about heading to bed. This is unusual for me. It's not quite 10 p.m. and I'm actually thinking about clicking on my electric blanket and choosing which new book to begin from my bedside stack.

I was even able to squeeze in about a half hour to do some of the online research that I've wanting to tackle. I made some notes and sent some emails. And now...

I'm done. And all just a little bit earlier than the "norm".

For as many years as I can remember (at my age, that isn't very many), I've had the same bedtime routine. Shower, brush, floss, drink a large glass of ice water, read until ice water (and ice) are gone, then slather my lips with Carmex, and lay down and work a sudoku puzzle until I fall asleep and nearly stab myself in the eye will my pencil.

          Aside: Occasionally, I've actually woken up the next morning to find those little eraser gunkies
                       stuck to my lips.

If I just "go to bed" I will never fall asleep. Reading and the few minutes of sudoku are a form of relaxation for me. It really helps to take my mind off of things.

I'm a mother of four, so for many years - and I mean many years - I carried diaper bags everywhere I went. Diaper bags always contained: Diapers, wipes, powder, Desitin, change of clothes, bibs, extra bottles/formula/snacks, plastic mat and bags for diaper changes/soiled clothes, favorite toys/books, pacifiers, pacifier clips, extra pacifiers, sanitizing wipes, etc. And so, as a mother of four, I most likely carried diaper bags everywhere I went for at least 8 years. Do you know how long it took me to get over the feeling of "I know I'm forgetting something." every time I left the house. I can still walk into a store and think I've forgotten something in the car.

          Aside: Once, after grocery shopping and getting everything into my car and driving out of the parking
                       lot, I completely panicked! An electric shock went through me and I began to sweat. It was so
                      quiet inside my minivan that I was certain, for that split-second of infinitesimal time, that I had
                      left my baby in the cart, now in the middle of the parking lot cart corral. I didn't. She was safely
                      buckled into her seat in the van - just being extra quiet.

My point being, that if I were to just go plain old straight to bed, turn off my lamp and lay down, I would essentially be awake for hours tossing and turning, wondering what I had forgotten to do. This is not a good feeling.

So tonight, I will follow my usual process and fall asleep.

Except last night, I had done just that. I had followed all of my usual steps to a "T". Not more than ten seconds after turning off my lamp and snuggling down into my warm flannels, something jolted me awake. I hadn't heard anybody get up and go to the bathroom, or even to the kitchen. My mind quickly went through any and all items that may have been left out in the kitchen that may have fallen over. Even if I had been able to think of a logical explanation, which I hadn't, I would still need to get up and check on whatever this noise was. Just as I was pulling open my bedroom door, the thought struck me that I may want to be quiet, just in case it was an intruder, or a monster or some such.

Luckily, it wasn't anything of the sort. In our kitchen we have a long overhead fluorescent light fixture. The kinds where the plastic casing just snaps onto the end caps of the fixture. The plastic casing had fallen off and - of course - had clattered onto the floor.

Very unusual, indeed. This fixture had not been touched since my husband and son had installed it several months ago. So after standing there in the dimly lit kitchen, looking down at the plastic casing and then back up at the fixture, and up and down several more times with no logical explanation of what had caused this coming to my mind, other than sometimes weird stuff just happens, I deemed it safe enough to pick up the casing and lean it against the cupboard. There was no way I was going to pull a chair over and stand on it while trying to pop this thing back into place at that late hour.

Nope. I just headed back to bed. Again picking up my sudoku to soothe myself back to sleep.

I know this is neither here nor there, but because it's been such a drag of

a cold winter, I thought that the sun felt glorious this weekend as it poured through my windows.

I felt a bit like this cat sitting there soaking it up.