My Little Slice of Heaven: Off to work I go...

I didn't post yesterday and I am not really posting today. I have been working at the post office... And I am drained right now. I want to go to bed so I can get a full nights sleep...like that will happen on a Friday night!

You have to understand that Friday nights aren't conducive for sleep around here. I work on Saturday's and for some unknown reason I can't ever get a full nights sleep on Friday nights. For one thing, Friday night is youth activity night at our church. So that means the girls are gone for the evening, and well into the night. Usually Lauren's group is doing something no where near where Megan's group is and at different times. So that means I usually have to take Megan, and go pick her up. Usually late...By the time we get back home, I get into bed and settle down, Noah gets restless and wakes up, or the dogs start barking at something...a car in the neighbors driveway, someone walking on the street, a squirrel that decides to take its life into its hands by coming down into our yard with three dogs...

For whatever reason, the dogs will bark, or a fire truck will go sloooowwwwwlllllyyyyyy by the house with its siren on...

Then if I am lucky, (I say this sarcastically, just in case you don't hear the sarcasm in my words), Lauren will come in before 2:00am and occasionally bring company. Don't get me wrong, I don't mind the company, but the walls in this house are paper thin. There must be nothing in between the wall boards at all, because I can hear every sound that is made in this house, especially when I am TRYING to get some sleep.

So once everyone is home safe and tucked into bed on Friday nights, I lie in bed thinking that I only have four hours left until I have to get up to go to work. So then I can't fall asleep, I am lying there wide away, thinking to myself how much I will regret this in the morning.

Then I hear Noah moving around in his room. His door will open and I will hear pitter-patter down the hallway. He will come climb in bed with Andrew and I. And when this happens there is no rest for anyone. He doesn't like to sleep right up next to anyone, so he will toss and turn, twist and move around until his head ends up at our feet, and his feet end up in our ribs and any other sensitive area of our bodies...

And all the while, I hear the clock ticking away, three more hours until the alarm goes off. (Not really ticking, I have an electric clock and there is no ticking, but I hear the minutes without sleep passing through my brain.)

At this point I began praying for sleep to come. I pray, thinking that maybe God has me awake to pray for someone. While praying, I fall asleep. Suddenly with an hour before my alarm clock is to sound the battle cry...I am bolted awake by the thud of the newspaper hitting the front door. I can envision my paper guy throwing the paper as hard as he can, pretending it is a missile and his target is me. It is payback for a car blocking him from easily pulling through our circle drive. Instead, someone, usually Lauren or one of her friends, has parked their car to far into the middle of the drive and he will have to pull in and then back out the way he came into the driveway. For this he will hit the door loudly with the rolled up paper so that it will wake me from the little slumber I am getting...

I am sure that he doesn't really do that, but at 5:00 in the morning, when I am trying to piece together four hours of sleep for the night, these are the thoughts I have about our paper guy.

I imagine that he is a little angry that he has to be out so early delivering papers to people who are lying in bed sleeping and he is going to make sure that if he has to be up "BY GOD, everyone else will be also."

So now, it is only minutes until my alarm will sound, telling me it is morning, time to rise and shine...

Because you know that unofficial motto of the post office:

"Neither snow nor rain nor heat nor gloom of night stays these couriers from the swift completion of their appointed rounds"

As I drag myself out of bed and face the long tedious day ahead, I am thinking;

"if I can just get home this evening, I am going to shower

and go straight to bed."

But we all know about good intentions. As much as I try not to drink caffeine or carbonated beverages, after a night like that, I have to stop at Sonic and get that large glass of Dr Pepper just to get my brain to function. And I have to follow it up with another one at lunch, and one on the route, just so I don't drag at the end of my work day. So by the time I get home, I am exhausted, from hard work, and the lack of sleep, not to mention the roller coaster of the caffeine high I have put my body through and the jolt I have enjoyed all day, has left me completely drained of every ounce of energy and I am riding that long spiral down, down, down...

I must interject this little tid-bit of information here. If you have never been a mail carrier, you just don't appreciate what mail carriers have to do. Yes, I know, I used to be just like you. I was so critical of my mail carrier if he did the least thing wrong. But like they say; until you've walked a mile in someones shoes... It is a physically and mentally demanding job. I never knew the extent of it, until I started doing it. Wow! I don't think I would want to do this until I was 60...I don't think my body could hold up to it.

I'm not saying this just to elicit sympathy, I know there are many other jobs that are as much or more demanding...but I've never worked one. I've had quite a broad resume in my lifetime, and I have to say, this one wears me out more than any of the other jobs I have had. Of course, a good nights sleep would probably go a long way in helping me to meet the challenges of the job. Wonder were I could get a good nights sleep...

All of this may be coming to an end anyway...I am working on a transfer to a post office in North Carolina, but if it doesn't happen, well I probably won't lose any sleep over it...

No pun intended...

Well, looks like I ended up posting after all. Just remember these are the words of a sleep depraved postal worker...those famous words that we aren't allowed to say anymore...

If I don't get some sleep, I just might go POSTAL....