Just today, I was doing research for this column titled Naps with Music. The contemplation/research (done during a light sleeping episode) was intense but a touch foggy, as I tended to drift off to grandiose images of myself actually being somebody. Prior to shifting into dreamtime, it had been my intention to mentally make a note of the pleasures that exist during a tidy nap in front of the old warm stove while in the company of soothing music. My research on this afternoon proved fleeting. I did not write anything down nor commit anything to memory—at least that I can repeat here.
Still, on my return to reality (whatever that is in these days of plagues and insurgencies) the topic was very fresh in my log-term thinking. It was there because I have always enjoyed these respites even though nothing really comes of them other than waking refreshed and sparkling with joy.
The day was perfect, overcast even more heavily than most days in the last fifty with no threat of the intruding sun. Some would say there was a gloom, maybe a pall of sorts, and no breeze. The chickadees and juncos were spending an inordinate amount of their free time casually flitting in and out of the brush pile. Many were taking a lead from me wanting to nap peacefully.
The music choices for my anticipated naps seem to vary depending on my mood and hopes for the remaining part of the day. Seldom would I approach some eastern European concoction in D minor for fear of finding myself lost in frozen steppes of Russia or even skating across Lake Baikal in subzero weather. The music has to be inspiring and image producing. This leaves most vocal performance off limits. James Brown doing I Feel Good is appropriate for a nap wakeup but not for the power down.
Bach Sonatas or partitas are pleasant but can be a touch nervous, maybe too many notes. Still something in D major can be refreshing, up lifting, a touch pushy, but mostly glorious. Recently, the magical tunes played on a Swedish nyckelharpa and accompanied with a Hardanger fiddle are found to be sublime, possibly because of my Swedish ancestry coming back, or is it a Viking thing. Because of my successful well-behaved sleep, I doubt the latter.
In addition to the well-chosen music, the actual initiation of nappy time has to be perfect. I like to have the woodstove warmed by oak, moderate but not hot. Importantly, the stove must be set up in such a way as to last unaltered for forty-five minutes, not rising in temperature, not cooling. Consistency in the name of the game.
Not critical, but of value for optimal dozing, lights can be off. Now even at mid-day, this means it will almost be dark because of the aforementioned Wisconsin’s dreary clime. My personal choice for napping posture is to sprawl out on the sofa, feet extended away from davenport maybe a full three feet. This is all done while slouched in a sitting position so that as I nap my mouth gaps open but I can’t drool uncontrollably. While I find this comfortable, some tell me I look like a wounded civil war soldier taking my last ’nap’ against a fallen log. Others in the family also seem to think my breathing is affected by this position in that it seems I emit a ‘death rattle’ while flopped out in repose. Of course, this is nonsense because, in truth, I am only in metaphorical heaven.
There does have to be a little clarity here because while I am only describing my own pleasures; this activity is not for everyone. I don’t have to work. I am age challenged and have already spent 60 years working. It is also true this desire possibly might be set off by day-drinking, say a nice port at 2:00. My point being, don’t look at this as advice but simply as an anecdotal experience by someone who now has idle time, and maybe an idle mind. However, from my position of being a life coach, it can be said that an afternoon nap is a beautiful thing.
At the moment, the Midwinter Waltz is starting to play, and I’m slouching after the oak has been added to the fire. My eyes are struggling to stay open. There is no guilt.
Once awake, there will be tea, Constant Comment if I recall, a new snap in my giddy-up and just maybe the sun will return.