Readers and writers blog

The sultry air of a July evening envelops me, caresses me, sedates me into an indolence where I do not seek but merely play host to questions that visit me:

• Why am I refreshed after four hours of sleep but still sleepy after eight? I slept today from 8 a.m. to 4 p.m., and now, as the sun slips into the orange horizon, I want to curl up again and doze.

I went to sleep last night at 10 p.m. and awoke at 2 a.m., my usual four hours, and I was wide awake. I balanced the family accounts, read our blogroll, walked on the treadmill, watched the stock market futures, even though I don’t own any stocks, then had a bowl of Wheaties with watered-down soymilk. Drifted off at 8 a.m. I should have been awake again before noon.

After three or four hours in bed, pain sets into my back, hips and other joints, some of them damaged by football in my youth and others just generally arthritic.

My doctor says it’s normal for someone in their late 60s to sleep in three- or four-hour segments. Mine usually are in the early morning and early afternoon, usually adding up to six hours or so. She says that’s fine, and all things considered, that I seem pretty healthy.

• Dreams? I had one last night where I was having trouble walking because, of all things, my shoulders hurt. Then I turned around and saw my mother standing there. I asked if I could lean on her to relieve the pain. She said yes, I did, and the pain went away.

I frequently have dreams where I am walking, jogging, sometimes bicycling long distances over routes that I remember only from other dreams. When I lived on the road for seven years back in the 1980s and ’90s, I walked four to six miles a day along local routes — but none of them that I travel in my dreams.

My mother died two years ago. She was 85, but it still was a shock and a terrible loss to me. I was always close to her, but especially so in the late 1940s after my father died. Maybe I’m still saying goodbye to her.

• Why does our dog Emily’s grave in our backyard seem so comforting to me? It’s in a shady corner, marked only by a wide hardwood stake to which her food dish, her leash and some plastic flowers have been attached. After Emily died of lymphoma last summer, my wife Bonnie and I buried her in a deep hole we had dug. Emily was wrapped in a quilt she had burrowed into so many times before settling down to a nap that it was in tatters.

Grass now grows on top of Emily and her tattered quilt. And even though I can still see them as I last saw them at the bottom of that hole, it’s . . . comforting. Maybe because I know that someday, perhaps not too long from now, I’ll be in a similar situation. And we’ll both be contributing ourselves back to the earth that gave us life.

It’s raining lightly outside now, and cool air is coming in the window behind me.

Today’s new offerings in our Works section

• Chapter 26: Cole Street of Gerard Jones’ nonfiction novel Ginny Good. Gerard meets Melanie, a voluptuous 19-year-old who is nothing like Ginny, and they move in together with Melanie’s 4-year-old daughter. Gerard thinks he is getting over Ginny — until he hears that she and friend Elliot are now living together.

• Chapter 14 of R.J. Keller’s novel Waiting for Spring. A July 4th family gathering at Tess’ apartment reignites her painful relationship with her mother, who makes it clear that she not only resents but dislikes her daughter. Brian comes to Tess’ defense, soothing the hurt and reinforcing her aspirations as an artist.

– Sid Leavitt

NOTE:

Bobby boyd is a contributor to the website Category Five, a blog from the National Weather Service in Old Hickory, Tenn.