Generally, I go to sleep early. My favorite sport in summer is to crawl into a bed bathed in the golden hues of sunset. I like going to bed early because a) I like being in bed under any circumstances and b) I like to sleep for up to eleven hours at a stretch. The only way to get that kind of slumber and also make a living is to go to bed early, at least in my experience.
I have a rule for my phone-bearing children (Mae and Lana) that on school nights they must relinquish their devices by nine p.m. Mae is johnny-on-the-spot, usually turning hers in early. Lana, however, in true Lana fashion, stages a silent protest to what she sees as an idiotic practice. Every night I have to bribe and cajole and threaten. And every night her phone is late.
The marriage of my early bedtime and the nine o’clock rule is not a happy one. Sometimes I, straining to keep my eyes on my kindle, text the girls that I’m falling asleep but to please turn their phones in at nine. This text always includes a plea specifically for Lana which comprises some reasoning, some begging and some stern talking-to. More often than not, I might wake up an hour into my slumber at 9:30, say, probably to the sound of Lana banging the bathroom door shut or the girls yelling at each other in Mae’s room (“Lana, get out of my room!” - I should make a bumper sticker). More than likely, Mae’s phone is carefully plugged in and stowed at my bedside. Lana’s is elsewhere.
And so I turn my phone back on (my pleasure in turning it to airplane mode when I get into bed is almost as keen as my pleasure in sleeping). I text Lana, perhaps in all caps. I might also voice a bellow, depending on my mood. The phone is promptly delivered (she can smell when I mean it). And I return to my kindle for another twenty minutes to calm my nervous system before a return to sleep is possible.
Last night, Friday, Lana was allowed to keep her phone. Mae is on a school trip to London (yes she’s in public school but it’s Marin County, home of fancy). I fell asleep at 10, after having a text exchange with a friend who couldn’t believe I was “up past my bedtime”. That is the usual response I get to texts I send after nine. My neighbor friends also get very concerned if my car isn’t in the driveway by 10:30. Josie, who lives directly across from me, judges her sleep health on the delta between when my bedroom light winks off and she turns off her own.
Last night, I was deeply asleep, dreaming about my friend who turns fifty today, when in my dream I heard a teenager loudly laughing. A very familiar teenager. Eyes now open wide, I found my phone. 12:58 a.m.
I texted Lana to stop yelling and go to sleep. That we would talk about this ridiculous transgression in the morning. Fucking kid. Then I opened my kindle, steaming.
The next morning, I woke to a text from Mae. “Sorry, Mom, Lana was talking to me.”
Which changed everything. The very worst thing as a parent is when your kids fight with each other. The very best thing is when they get along. Lana laughing at one a.m. to whatever Mae was saying from her London midmorning, that makes me the opposite of mad. Fucking kids. Somehow they always win. At least Lana does.
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