With regard to sleeping alone

“I don’t like to sleep alone, sad to think some folks do,” So crooned, the singer. But today I write on behalf of sleeping alone. The best thing about sleeping alone is uninterrupted snoring.  When sleeping alone, I can snore all I want. No poke and prods, no shaking and waking; just sound, uninterrupted sleep.

Since snoring has such a bad reputation with roommates, campers, and close knit families, let me explain why this is important to me. For the majority of the years of my life, I have been a light sleeper. My mother even said so. I did not even allow her to play the piano or vacuum while I napped as an infant. As I made my way through childhood, every bump in the night, every creak and groan of the house was likely to wake me. I was constantly vigilant, even in sleep.  Never did I relax.  This trait came in handy when raising my own children. When they needed me, I was there in a whisper. When my daughter came along, I cultivated a skill of not only waking at a moment’s notice, but also falling back to sleep quickly.  I was many years into adulthood before I learned to sleep deep and long.  By that time, tissues, nose and throat membranes had aged, swollen, become vibrant.  Also by that time, through advertisement of remedies, snoring had moved from a natural result of sleep to an unwanted social fax pas to be remedied and cured. I am sure I possess faults that need to be addressed and corrected; but sleeping deep, care-less, and waking refreshed is not one of them.

Yes, the best thing about sleeping alone is uninterrupted snoring. The worst thing about sleeping alone will probably not receive voice from me in public pages.