Slumber cause for embarrassment

Have you fallen asleep in public lately? I have. The Lady of the House and I were chatting with friends when the next thing I knew they were all staring at me. Everyone was wearing sly smiles; you know, the kind that say “We know something you don’t.”

“You were sleeping,” said Padre Ricardo.

“Nooooo, not me,” I said. “I just closed my eyes.”

“Yeah,” said The Lady of the House. “You closed your eyes and took a five-minute nap.”

Drifting off to sleep has a lot to do with my day job. I have to get up at 3:45 in the morning. By 3 or 4 in the afternoon I need a nap. I try to catch a few winks before I go out afternoons. Sometimes I don’t, and that can lead to some embarrassing situations.

There was that time I was taking a dance class. (Yes, me dancing.) I enrolled as a favor for a teacher friend of mine to help fill the class. Anyway, every class started with warmups – you know, stretching legs and stuff. One evening I was particularly tired. I lay on my side on the shiny wood floor on the warm spring evening slowly doing leg lifts. I thought I’d rest my eyes for just a moment. Next thing I knew there was music in the air and dancers in sweat pants and tights were swirling around me.

“Ah, Sleeping Beauty has awakened,” said the teacher.