Anyone who knows me, knows that I am PASSIONATE about recording family stories. While I get little to no satisfaction doing true research based genealogy, there are few things I like more than sitting down with a family member, preferably with a tape recorder running and asking them questions about their life. It doesn't matter how old they are, even three year old's can be surprisingly insightful to life, I just love getting hearing and keeping for posterity people's life stories.
Anyway,the big family gift this year is a piano, so we are trying to limit spending on each each other this Christmas. So, for Dentist Husband, I contacted all of his siblings and asked them to write one or more stories/memories they have that deal with him. He is the third child of (gulp) nine children. All of them by the way university graduates (ok, the jury is still out on the youngest, but he is only a few years away from finishing his graphic design degree from BYU--Go cougars.)
Anyway, I had to post this story because it really captures what a great man I am married to. I had to go through and change his real name to dentist husband in every case, but besides that, this is what was sent to me by my husband's youngest sister (8 of 9).
The story I feel I must tell comes from the deep recesses of my mind and is filled with a lot of myth. But to this day, I believe that it is true! And now I will continue my story.
There are a lot of things I remember about dentist husband; the way he would play with us on weekends during high school and then in college he'd come home to watch Star Trek... or was it to eat dinner with the fam? I can't remember exactly which. Still, I remember that he made an effort to spend time with us little ones whenever he could.
I remember one night especially when I was about 5 or 6 years old, we were all placed under his watch. (Note to Janice: I swear proper nouns ending with an 's' get an extra apostrophe 's' when used to show possession... if this is not true, please change it to be correct). I had been sent to bed (I say sent because I rarely fell asleep as soon as I went to bed. I would lay awake for hours it seemed staring at the ceiling imagining patterns there, or thinking of stories about people and places in my life and then convince myself they were true.) I had been placed in bed and was instructed to go to sleep. But I began to think, and I began to think about how awesome it would be if I could still be awake and doing stuff. I tossed and I turned and I strained to hear the faint sound of the television. Blast! Dentist husband is watching a good show I'm sure! I tried sleeping the other way, repeating to myself that my body was tired a la Mom's style ("my toes are sleepy... my toes are sleepy... my toes are sleepy...") and nothing seemed to work.
So, up I got. I went to him (because one cannot get out of bed without providing an adequate explanation to the supervising adult of the time) to tell him the new development. "Dentist husband," said I, "I cannot sleep at all. I know what you're thinking, 'You just want to be awake and doing stuff,' but that's not it. I really think I cannot sleep at all tonight... I think that I'll just never sleep."
He looked at me semi-frustrated, semi-understandingly. I could tell that the wheels in his head were turning. As I sat there wondering what my fate might be, he came to a conclusion. "Oh really?" he replied, "You've tried everything? Well, then, it's time for my special remedy."
Special remedy? Could there really be a "special remedy" for not-being-able-to-go-to-sleep? I was torn between relief and disappointment. On the one hand, this was the end of my aspirations to be awake and doing stuff, and on the other hand I could be free from the seemingly endless days of lying awake each night. I considered his offer and, being curious, chose to follow him to the kitchen.
Once there, I was asked to sit up at the counter on one of the stools and wait while he put together the mixture. I tried to catch glimpses of the ingredients he chose so that I might decide in my mind whether or not this remedy was a fluke, but he kept the lights low and his back to me. The only thing I really saw was milk. "Milk, eh?" I thought, "That's not so bad... and not so remedy-ish either... I'll wait to see what unfolds."
When he was finally finished he handed me a milky brown liquid and began, "Now this is pretty powerful stuff. Take a sip and you'll start to feel sleepy immediately."
"How sleepy?" I think I asked.
"Oh, pretty sleepy. Your arms will start to feel heavy (I distinctly remember this "arms" bit) and your eyelids will start to close. But don't worry, I'll help you get back to your bed if you need some help."
I looked at the brownish liquid, inquired as to the ingredients, to which I was answered that it was a secret recipe, and with apprehension, I took a sip. I'm not sure I know exactly how to describe the flavor, but I think in my 5 or 6 year old mind the word I came up with was "gross". The milky brown liquid was extremely sweet and kind of organic tasting, like it came from dead leaves or something (He later told me it was molasses... go figure). I swallowed it down with a shiver and waited for its effects to kick in.
And they did!
My arms began to feel heavy, very heavy in fact, and then my eyelids began to close without being told to.
"How do you feel?" he asked."I don't know," I said, trying to avoid the inevitable for as long as I could.
"Are your arms getting heavy?"
"Yes."
"Is it difficult to keep your eyes open?"
"Yes," I was getting progressively more sleepy.
"Why don't you take one more sip just to make sure?"
I reluctantly took another sip... significantly smaller this time and evaluated the results. I tell you I was sleepy! And genuinely sleepy! It had worked! Again, I was both elated and dismayed. But I couldn't seem to control those increasingly heavy arms of mine.
He told me that he'd put the special remedy in the fridge, just in case I woke up again (I remember making up my mind not to tell he even if I did) and helped me off the stool and off to bed (I think I remember him telling me that I was quite dramatic at this point, unable to walk in a strait line or watch where I was going). After that, I fell right to sleep.
In the morning, I opened the fridge to investigate. What was it that had made me so sleepy? Was it real or was it a dream? But, there it was, that milky brown liquid that I had so loathed and loved. It was real and I couldn't deny it.
Try as I may, I have never been able to replicate such an effective insomnia remedy, nor do I plan to. But I do remember how impressed I was with my older brother. Gees, he knows everything!
