even though...

it wasn't really all that funny: me waking up in the wee hours, long before the (too early) time to get up and dress for heading out the door to work. I had to laugh. Which I did, although it was not much more than a small 'ha', if anyone had been nearby by to hear me bemused, they would have surely been concerned about my well-being and sanity.

I consume various and sundry potions before going to bed in hopes of sleeping well (and have actually given up on the possibility of sleeping All Night). With varying degrees of success, as there is an occasional, rare night when I am surprised at the time when I awake and glance at the digital clock across the room. But mostly awakening hours before there is any reason to actually get out of my warm little nest and dress to start the day. For the past two mornings I have been at work at 5:00 am, which means setting an alarm, for fear it will be that rare day when I do sleep well and don't startle awake to get on the go early enough.

But what happened today when I woke far too early will likely not have meaning to anyone else on the planet except my only sibling.  In the winter when it gets dark so early, still shortly after 6 pm. here, and stays dark for twelve hours, it's also fairly dark in our house, though there is some ambient light from neighbors who leave outdoor lights on round the clock and distant street illumination. I normally cannot tell if it is midnight or 6 a.m. when I wake, until I sit up to look at the glowing numbers on the clock. Today the numbers on the clock: 229. Sounds  like an ungodly hour to waken, and especially if your brain starts whirring so there is no hope of going back to sleep... knowing you have set the alarm for 4 o'clock, and anxious about it not going off to cause you to oversleep.

My dad's post office box number for about fifty years was 229. I knew it by heart when I was a little person, and he would let me go in and get the mail, with key in hand, all by myself: just like I was Really Somebody.  I wrote hundreds of letters to that address over the years, after I left home, and desperate to stay connected with parents. That number is so firmly imbedded in  my brain it is one of several I use for pin numbers with things that require you to have a password. Not something I will ever forget. So when I awakened and looked at the clock this morning, I had to laugh... wish  I had gone back to sleep, but that didn't happen....