Relative Something

It’s one of those days. I can’t help it. When nothing specific has happened, it’s as if nothing but dreams start bubbling up in my head and flowing out of my fingers onto the keyboard. I suppose it doesn’t help that I gave in to an urge to rewatch the insane Steven Conrad dark-comedy-spy-drama series, “Patriot” last night. A lot of this series is like a bad dream.

Rewatching a much-loved television series is like visiting with old friends you haven’t seen in a long while. It’s why we returned to the beginning of “Reservation Dogs” after finishing the last season. We missed all the characters.

I’m wondering if the spy movie, “Argylle” might have triggered my memories of the “Patriot” series. I understand these shows aren’t for everyone, and I don’t know what my appreciation for them says about me beyond my comfort with dark humor, but they seem to ring some pleasure bells in my head.

Yesterday, I allowed myself to fade into a mid-day slumber in the recliner and dreamed I was floating with a life vest in some water and trying to answer a question Cyndie had asked me from her seat in a low-riding boat. As I attempted to answer I found myself sinking below the surface and I couldn’t do anything about it. My eyes wouldn’t open and my hands and feet wouldn’t move.

I thought to myself, “If I could just open my eyes…” but I couldn’t because I was sleeping at the time. And that is what woke me. My ‘dream self’ began to recognize that my ‘real self’ was asleep. I find moments of lucidity in dreams to be a gift.

Sleeping well enough to enjoy my dreams is also a gift. I do not take for granted my good fortune of having cultivated good sleep habits. I owe a lot of my sleeping success to the information I learned in Matthew Walker’s book, “Why We Sleep – Unlocking the Power of Sleep and Dreams.” I highly recommend it!

Since good sleep is one of the more important aspects of optimal health, it is something of a chicken-and-egg dilemma. There is a positive feedback loop in that good health allows for good sleep and getting good sleep is high up on the list of healthy things we can do for ourselves.

If you are out of sync, for either health or sleep, I don’t know if one is solvable before the other. Which comes first?

Don’t bother pondering the question. We can’t lose if we set our sights on striving for both at the same time!

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