Insomnia?

A good night's sleep is a very satisfying thing. All my live I've heard older people, especially, complaining of not sleeping well. As I seem to be older, my observation is that it comes mainly from not getting enough real exercise. A tired body needs sleep and will usually sink happily into slumerland. I certainly experienced that dring the week I was walking every day on park trails for three to seven miles.

But there are times when I get a good night's tossing and turning, as was true last night. Sometimes it seems I've simply caught up on all the sleep I really need and the body says 'Basta! Turn on the radio and listen to some piece of music you can't identify." Or sometimes it says, "Stop wasting perfctly good time, turn on the light and read for a while." But sometimes something needs to be gnawed at by the semi-awake brain. Not gnawing at a worry, not solving some problem, not planning an action. Just preparing the thought process for dealng with a matter that is coming up -- could be as simple as a trip to the dentist or a vacation. Whatever. One simply accepts this is what the body wants to do, why resist? Why resent? The body is not an enemy; it is part of me and knows sometimes more than my conscious thoughts know.

It is a bit irritating when that demanding psychic level does it's rumbing and mumbling from 2;00 to 5:30 and then lapses into a very pleasant sleep half an hour before the clock radio is going to come on and wake me at 6:00. Happily I don't have to leap out of bed, I can drift awake, which is why the clock radio is actually set for five minute before th hour -- so there are five minute of music before that well rounded, unruffled radio voice starts to tell me about bombings in Afghanistan and trouble in Israel and that it's going to be 88 and humid during the coming day. I tend to think a lot of the moaning about bad nights of not sleeping come from having not enogh to do and from assuming the body is a separate entity that exists to cause problems for the "real" you. So, just where does that "real you" live? Huh?