Is it hot in here or...?

One of the challenges of late-in-life parenting is being surrounded by thirty-somethings who don't realize that one night in the future, they will wake up and be hot. Not hot like Paris Hilton, hot like "OH MY GOD, IS THE HOUSE ON FIRE?" and when they realize it is not, and have thrown all the covers on top of whatever significant other lies beside them, they will quietly wonder... "Is it me?"

Welcome to the winter of my discontent. For the past 6 weeks, I have been intermittently hot, kind of hot, and "OH MY GOD, IS THE MALL ON FIRE?" hot. At first I blamed it on the geese or ducks or whatever we get the down from combined with California's unseasonably warm winter weather, until I found myself in hotel in North Carolina during a snowstorm tripping over the comforters I had thrown to the floor in an effort to find the thermostat so I could turn on the air conditioner... and saw that the temperature in the room was 70 degrees. Not exactly hot like the face of the sun. Since then, I have come to terms with the fact that no, it's not hot in here and yes, it is just me. But really... is it JUST me???? Surely there is some other 49 year old mother of a ten year old who occasionally has the desire to rip off all her clothes and stand in front of the open refrigerator in the middle of the night!

Ah, the middle of the night... that brings up some more uncharted territory - insomnia. It's one thing to wake up in the middle of the night sweating, kick off the covers and go blissfully back to sleep. It's another to get into bed at a reasonable hour and still be awake two and a half hours later, having already completed 4 or 5 rounds of cold (covers on), hot (covers off), really hot (pajamas off), only warm (just the sheet), hot (kick covers onto sleeping husband), cold (put pajamas back on), warm (kick sleeping husband just because), hot (tear off pajamas again). cool (just sheet), cold (pull on corner of comforter), comfortable (ready to fall asleep), fine (any minute now I'll be sleeping), not hot (is that the clock ticking in the bathroom?), starting to get annoyed (why do I not feel tired?!), worried (I'm never going to be able to get up in the morning if I don't get to sleep right NOW!), hungry (maybe if I eat a banana...), mad (how can he sleep when it's so hot in here?!), HOT!!! At which point I get up and log onto Facebook, change my status to my bra color and play wordscraper.

On the bright side, I have no trouble sleeping in the morning. Except - I don't have time to sleep in the morning!!!! I need to be up!!! Breakfasts to make, daughter to wake, vitamins to take - those lazy days of summer are long gone. Except, to be honest, it's still winter break here. (No, I don't know WHY we get so much time off here? So we can travel to YOUR neighborhood where it's cold and snowy and we'll appreciate where we live more?) So I sleep in. For one more day. Then, WHAM! That alarm will go off and we will catapult into the day like a raccoon shot out of a cannon. On the bright side, maybe I won't be hot.