Sleeping Through the Night

I recently had the pleasure of greeting a brand new person into the world.  She is the lovely new grand-daughter of close friends and although she is only a week old, she is already exceeding the expectations of her adoring public by reaching that anxiously anticipated benchmark of baby development .... sleeping through the night!

Well, maybe not through YOUR night, but certainly through what I can accumulate in consecutive hours of shut-eye.  

She seems able to do all the things a baby is supposed to do during a busy day....feed, eliminate, gaze intelligently into any pair of eyes hovering a few feet from her sweet face, roll her tiny head around on her fragile neck while everyone gasps in amazement at her athleticism.  Occasionally she fusses a bit, when all is not perfect, but then her attendants hasten to ease any discomfort and she soon coos with contentment.  By the time the evening rolls around, she is ready to snuggle into her bassinet and visit dreamland for at least six hours..... IN A ROW! 

I wish I could do the same.

It's a vicious circle....I begin (or is it end?) by waking up way too early in the morning.  Actually, it's really still night, unless you have the schedule of an early morning TV host.  My eyes pop open at about 4 am. and I am raring to go....but where can one go at that hour?  I reach over for my iPad to check if anything has happened since the last time I checked...about 3 hours ago, and discover that at 2 am, one of my friends has played a new word in our never-ending game of WordsWithFriends.  I check my email and there's a note from another friend, who can't sleep either, sending me some jokes.  My cousin is already up and at 'em....she likes to flip me the latest bunch of silly pictures of weird animals mixed in with tributes to various Holocaust heroes when she wakes up before dawn.  I dutifully respond to my sleep-deprived network, read up on the new online editions of newspapers and magazines and count the minutes till it seems reasonable to stir.  

By the time the rest of my world gets moving, I am the most well-informed person in my universe.

I suppose I could just get out of bed and DO something....bake muffins or give myself a facial, like Martha does.   I could go for a walk, but who knows who I might run into at that hour?  
Or I could even exercise....no, I couldn't! 

I am full of energy until after lunch, when I crave a little shluff.  I find Andrea Mitchell a useful soporific and before you know it, I've passed out.  After dinner, with nothing exciting to do, I often lie down to watch the evening rundown on MSNBC and nod off almost immediately, in spite of Rachel's haranguing.  My husband will try to revive me in time for Jon Stewart, but by then, I'm unconscious.  

I simply have to get in my few hours of sleepy time before awakening at around 1 am. for my first watch of the long night.