Do Not Drive, Operate Machinery or…

There’s something beautiful about the way people appear when they are sleeping.

Don’t you think so too?

I’m a people watcher. It doesn’t matter where I am or what they are doing, I enjoy watching every day people while they do every day things. I think it all goes back to when I was a little girl.

Two year olds are short and I was no exception to the rule. Many nights I started out in my own bedroom, but would awaken shortly thereafter with a nightmare. Clad in my cotton nightgown, I would silently walk into my parent’s room on cold little feet. Since I was so short, I could barely see the top of the mattress on their bed. Both Mom and Dad always seemed to sleep on their sides, so I could see their faces without any problem. Many nights I would stand next to the bed and watch them sleep.

Dad slept with his mouth and eyes slightly open, but didn’t snore. Mom was totally silent and her hair always seemed to be perfect. I would go from one side of the bed to the other just watching them. The main objective was to get in the bed and sleep the rest of the night cuddled in between them, but there usually wasn’t a rush to get there unless I was scared.

After my sister was born, I was obsessed with “taking care of her.” Unfortunately for me, she slept fourteen hours a day, every day and insisted on being in her crib. That didn’t deter me, however, because Mom would let me just sit in the crib and watch her sleep.

Obviously, not much has changed.

When Alyssa was a baby, I held her all the time…literally. So when she took a nap, it was in my arms and I was usually staring at her. I loved looking at her long eyelashes and little puckered lips. I dreamed of what her life and personality would be like when she grew up.

This morning Alyssa woke up with a terrible kink in her neck. All day she struggled with the pain which gave her a headache and made her feel nauseated. When I received this text at work earlier, I knew we were going to be busy…

“I need to go to Patient First after work because my kink is giving me searing pains.”

Since she is still under eighteen, I knew that I would have to venture into the germ zone and be surrounded by sick people! Being the dutiful mother, we were in the office almost immediately after I got home from work.

The doctor asked, “Did you hurt your neck while exercising, exerting yourself, or by doing unusual lifting or anything physical to pull your muscles?”

“No,” Alyssa responded.

“Are you stressed?”

Alyssa said, “No.”

With a slight smile, the doctor said, “Since you didn’t do anything physical to cause the pain, nothing in your neck is torn. However, people get kinks in their neck because stress gets stored in those muscles. Obviously, you must have stress you are trying to suppress.”

I nearly laughed out loud. Three cheers for telling her like it is, Doc!

Alyssa smiled.

He proceeded to talk about how inflamed the muscles are because all day long she has been fighting with the pain. The more she fought it, the more the muscles spasmed. After the appointment, armed with an anti-inflammatory and muscle relaxer, Alyssa drove us back home.

The last thing the doctor said was, “This medication will make you drowsy and dizzy, so do not drive, operate machinery or perform any hazardous activity.

I don’t think we have to worry about that because Alyssa is going to become Sleeping Beauty in just a few minutes and I will thoroughly enjoy watching the transformation.

Good ni-i-i-i-ight!