When I was in the Peace Corps, getting together with other volunteers was a significant source of entertainment. Even without phones or e-mail, we managed to organize pretty efficiently, and if you got the word out that you were hosting a party, you could count on 20-odd fellow volunteers showing up at your door with bedrolls and bottles of homemade wine. People traveled long distances on short cash reserves, so any gathering alwyas turned into a sleep-over. Sharing floor space with friends, you quickly learned about everyone’s odd sleep habits: who talked in her sleep, who snored to wake the dead, who slept lying on his back with his hands folded over his chest like a vampire.

One night, a bunch of us were sacked out in my friend B’s apartment by the beach. He had a little basement flat that was three rooms leading one into another, with no hallway. The kichen/bathroom combination was just off the first room. There were three or four people in each room, most of us sleeping on mats on the floor. I was deeply asleep when I woke suddenly to the sound of screaming. First one person, then two, then five or six. I had just read In Cold Blood, and my first thought was that we were all being murdered like the Clutters in our beds. Naturally I started yelling too. Finally, someone turned on the lights to reveal ten people shrieking, “Aaah! aaaah! aaah!” for no apparent reason.

Eventually we figured out nothing was wrong; one person’s bad dream had just started a chain reaction, a kind of mass somnolent hysteria. Once we were awake, we were SO awake; we couldn’t stop laughing about it.

No one tells you that when you have more than one kid, that’s pretty much what every night is like. You can’t really call it an evening until the baby’s scream has roused the older kid, whose crying wakes the dog, whose barking wakes the mother, whose nudging wakes the father.

I hate being awakened suddenly from a deep sleep. I guess no one likes it, but I actually fear it. That split second between hearing the noise and being capable of evaluating it: Poop explosion or home invasion? I dread it.

I dread it so much that when Husband’s away, I can barely get to sleep at all. Somehow it’s OK when there’s another adult in the house to help me negotiate the night terrors, but when I’m alone I sit in front of the TV half the night, putting off sleep to put off that horrible moment. I’m currently running a three-night sleep deficit, and it’s starting to show.

Well, I suppose I can sleep when I’m on the road. I have a two-week three-city tour coming up.

I do miss everyone when I travel…but not at night.