Sweet Dreams

by Gwen Cooper — October 1, 2007

Chalk it up to my Miami upbringing, but I consider afternoon siesta to be one of the most civilized customs any people ever came up with. There's all kinds of scientific evidence out there to support the theory that the human body's energy level takes a natural "dip" in the early afternoon--and also to support the idea that it might make more sense to work with it than against it. Justify it (or criticize it) however you like, but for myself I can only say that I dearly love an afternoon nap. Especially on the weekends. Robert, on the other hand, is resolutely anti-nap, which usually ends up becoming a source of minor contention between us.

I should clarify that I'm a very early riser (as early as 5:00am, most mornings), and I also tend to stay up somewhat late. So an afternoon nap is really the only chance I get to make up for the "lost" sleep. And I have to say that early afternoon is the time of day I least mind missing. The city is quiet and mysterious early in the morning, vibrant and dazzling after-hours. In the afternoons, it's merely crowded and busy--not to mention hot during the summer and even the early fall--and so there's little to attract me to stir out of doors during those hours if I can avoid it.

Robert also stays up late, but he tends to be a late riser in the mornings. I can certainly understand how, having slept until noon, he's reluctant to get into bed again at 2:00. But the arrangement puts a definite crimp in our plans. If he's not up until noon, there's nothing for us to do together (other than be unconscious) before then. And if I want to be napping by 2:00 or 3:00, it doesn't leave much of a window for a day that doesn't get started until around 1:00.

And so we usually end up in--very mild--disagreements over what to do with our Sunday afternoons. Robert thinks that I never feel like going out. I know that I've been out and back and done all kinds of things, hours before his day has even started. Robert feels he's entitled to sleep late on the weekends. I agree, but don't see why I should have to give up my afternoon nap on the weekends--the only days when I can actually do so. It's usually hard for either of us to entirely sympathize with the other's point of view.

Yesterday morning, I woke up early as usual. The day was so incredibly beautiful, the streets so serene and bewitching, that I couldn't help it: I woke Robert up. "Come on," I whispered in his ear. "Let's go to one of those brunch places we can never get into because the wait's too long--my treat."

I felt almost like I was introducing him to a new world, this man who's lived in this city more than twice as long as I have. But I knew he was seeing it from a whole new perspective--my perspective--and that, for that one day at least, he liked what he saw.

We went to one of our favorite bagel places, which was deliciously uncrowded, and feasted to our hearts' content. Then we walked through parks and quiet streets for a while, hand-in-hand, enjoying the feeling of having the city all to ourselves.

We ended up staying out for several hours, until about 2:00 or so. Robert gave an enormous yawn as we came back into my apartment. "Wow," he said sleepily. "I could definitely use a nap..."

Gwen Cooper is the author of Diary of a South Beach Party Girl, recently published by Simon & Schuster. To read all of Gwen Cooper's posts in "The Dating Life," click here.