Afternoon Nap Quotes

Learn from yesterday, live for today, look to tomorrow, rest this afternoon.

Think what a better world it would be if we all-the whole world-had cookies and milk about three o'clock every afternoon and then lay down with our blankies for a nap. Or if all governments had as a basic policy to always put things back where they found them and to clean up their own mess. And it is still true, no matter how old you are-when you go out into the world, it is best to hold hands and stick together.

Tigerkit was nagging his mother. "Why can't I go out?" "You've just come in." "But it's a sunny day." "You need a nap." "I'm not tired." "You will be later." "I'll sleep then." "But you'll be grumpy all afternoon if you don't nap now." "No, I won't." "Yes, you will.

These are the things I learned (in Kindergarten): 1. Share everything. 2. Play fair. 3. Don't hit people. 4. Put things back where you found them. 5. CLEAN UP YOUR OWN MESS. 6. Don't take things that aren't yours. 7. Say you're SORRY when you HURT somebody. 8. Wash your hands before you eat. 9. Flush. 10. Warm cookies and cold milk are good for you. 11. Live a balanced life - learn some and drink some and draw some and paint some and sing and dance and play and work everyday some. 12. Take a nap every afternoon. 13. When you go out into the world, watch out for traffic, hold hands, and stick together. 14. Be aware of wonder. Remember the little seed in the Styrofoam cup: The roots go down and the plant goes up and nobody really knows how or why, but we are all like that. 15. Goldfish and hamster and white mice and even the little seed in the Styrofoam cup - they all die. So do we. 16. And then remember the Dick-and-Jane books and the first word you learned - the biggest word of all - LOOK.

Think what a better world it would be if we all, the whole world, had cookies and milk about three o'clock every afternoon and then lay down on our blankets for a nap.

I do not particularly like the word 'work.' Human beings are the only animals who have to work, and I think that is the most ridiculous thing in the world. Other animals make their livings by living, but people work like crazy, thinking that they have to in order to stay alive. The bigger the job, the greater the challenge, the more wonderful they think it is. It would be good to give up that way of thinking and live an easy, comfortable life with plenty of free time. I think that the way animals live in the tropics, stepping outside in the morning and evening to see if there is something to eat, and taking a long nap in the afternoon, must be a wonderful life. For human beings, a life of such simplicity would be possible if one worked to produce directly his daily necessities. In such a life, work is not work as people generally think of it, but simply doing what needs to be done.

I miss the way he used to kiss my shoulder whenever it was bare and he was nearby. I miss how he cleared his throat before he took a sip of water and scratched his left arm with his right hand when he was nervous. I miss how he tucked my hair behind my ear when it came loose and took my temperature when I was sick or when he was bored. I miss his glasses on my nightstand. I miss watching him take Sunday afternoon naps on my couch, with the newspaper resting on his stomach like a blanket. How his hands stayed clasped, fingers intertwined, while he slept. I miss the cadence of his speech and the stupidity of his puns. I miss playing doctor when we made love, and even when we didn't. I miss his smell, like fresh laundry and honey (because of his shampoo) at his place. Fresh laundry and coconut (because of my shampoo) at mine. I miss that he used to force me to listen to French rap and would sing along in a horrible accent. I miss that he always said "I love you" when he hung up the phone with his sister, never shy or embarassed, regardless of who else was around. I miss that his ideal Friday night included a DVD, eating Chinese food right out of the carton, and cuddling on top of my duvet cover. I miss that he reread books from his childhood and then from mine. I miss that he was the only man that I have ever farted on, and with, freely. I miss that he understood that the holidays were hard for me and that he wanted me to never feel lonely.

Think of what a better world it would be if we all - the whole world had cookies and milk about 3 o'clock every afternoon and then lay down with our blankets for a nap.

I count it as an absolute certainty that in paradise, everyone naps. A nap is a perfect pleasure and it's useful, too. It splits the day into two halves, making each half more manageable and enjoyable. How much easier it is to work in the morning if we know we have a nap to look forward to after lunch; and how much more pleasant the late afternoon and evening become after a little sleep. If you know there is a nap to come later in the day, then you can banish forever that terrible sense of doom one feels at 9 A.M. with eight hours of straight toil ahead. Not only that, but a nap can offer a glimpse into a twilight nether world where gods play and dreams happen.

Luc moved to the center of the floor. "I don't have all day, guys. I have things to do. A nap I want to take this afternoon. There's a new movie out on Netflix I want to watch, and a goddamn coupon for a free Whopper Jr. that's calling my name.

But the muse won’t always cooperate and she will never be coerced. Sometimes she’d rather take a nap or see a mid-afternoon movie.

Books have always been my escape - where I go to bury my nose, hone my senses, or play the emotional tourist in a world of my own choosing... Words are my best expressive tool, my favorite shield, my point of entry...When I was growing up, books took me away from my life to a solitary place that didn't feel lonely. They celebrated the outcasts, people who sat on the margins of society contemplating their interiors. . . Books were my cure for a romanticized unhappiness, for the anxiety of impending adulthood. They were all mine, private islands with secret passwords only the worthy could utter. If I could choose my favorite day, my favorite moment in some perfect dreamscape, I know exactly where I would be: stretched out in bed in the afternoon, knowing that the kids are taking a nap and I've got two more chapters left of some heartbreaking novel, the kind that messes you up for a week.

Who can resist sleep at two or three in the afternoon in these sunlit parts of the Mediterranean?

A beautiful nap this afternoon that put velvet between my vertebrae.

Ever afternoon, me and Baby Girl set in the. rocking chair before her nap. Ever afternoon, I tell her: You kind, you smart, you important. But she growing up and I know, soon, them few words ain't gone be enough.

Think what a better world it would be if...the whole world had cookies and milk about three o’clock every afternoon and then lay down with our blankies for a nap.

There’s lots to do; we have a very busy schedule—— “At 8 o’clock we get up, and then we spend “From 8 to 9 daydreaming. “From 9 to 9:30 we take our early midmorning nap. “From 9:30 to 10:30 we dawdle and delay. “From 10:30 to 11:30 we take our late early morning nap. “From 11:30 to 12:00 we bide our time and then eat lunch. “From 1:00 to 2:00 we linger and loiter. “From 2:00 to 2:30 we take our early afternoon nap. “From 2:30 to 3:30 we put off for tomorrow what we could have done today. “From 3:30 to 4:00 we take our early late afternoon nap. “From 4:00 to 5:00 we loaf and lounge until dinner. “From 6:00 to 7:00 we dillydally. “From 7:00 to 8:00 we take our early evening nap, and then for an hour before we go to bed at 9:00 we waste time. “As you can see, that leaves almost no time for brooding, lagging, plodding, or procrastinating, and if we stopped to think or laugh, we’d never get nothing done.

[The writer] can easily foresee his fate ... in an age when an author who wants to have readers must take care to write in such a way that the book can easily be perused during an afternoon nap ....

Here are a few things I've learned from Albert -- 1. Any food is fair game until it is actually swallowed by someone else. 2. Take a nap whenever you can. 3. Don't bark unless it's important. 4. Chasing one's tail is sometimes unavoidable.

After we became a couple, she composed our time together. She planned days as if they were artistic events. One afternoon we went to Tybee Island for a picnic; we ate blueberries and drank champagne tinted with curacao and listened to Miles Davis, and when I asked the name of her perfume, she said it was L'Heure Bleue. She talked about 'perfect moments.' One such moment happened that afternoon; she'd been napping; I lay next to her, reading. She said, 'I'll always remember the sounds of the sea and of pages turning, and the smell of L'Heure Bleue. For me they signify love.

A dream you don’t have to fight for isn’t a dream—it’s a nap. One changes your afternoon. The other changes your world. Keep fighting.

we're the adults here so we take naps in the middle of the afternoon with the window open. there's an ice cream truck singing down the street and I haven't hung up my clothes. I text your mother a picture of you on your first day of work and say isn't he handsome. our toothbrushes sitting in a cup on the edge of the sink are the most intimate thing I have ever known.

My lord! We thought you were taking an afternoon nap!” “Sorry to disappoint you,” the earl of Sheffield drawled, his voice muffled by the rug. “Someone must have forgotten to tuck me into my cradle.

I miss my old paycheck and the sense of pride, power, and worth that it gave me. I make a lot less money now. A lot less. But what I’ve lost in dollars, I’ve gained in time. I have time in the afternoons now to help Charlie and Lucy with their homework, to play Wii with them, to watch Charlie’s soccer games, to take a nap with Linus. I can’t wait to spend afternoons snowboarding. I have time to paint a portrait of Lucy (my only child who will sit still long enough) or the apples we picked at the local orchard. I have time to read novels, to meditate, to watch the deer walk across the backyard, to have dinner every night with my family. Less money, more time. So far, the trade-off has been worth every penny.

Looking back on those childhood days, I carry in my mind a picture of grandmother in her rocking chair with a contented owlet sprawled across her aproned lap. Once, on entering a room while she was taking her afternoon nap, I saw one of the owlets had crawled up her pillow til its head was snuggled under her ear. Both grandmother and the owlet were snoring.

I don't have all day, guys. I have things to do. A nap I want to take this afternoon. There's a new movie out on Netflix I want to watch, and a goddamn coupon for a free Whopper Jr. that's calling my name.

Well, what am I supposed to do?" "Well, you can take a nap, read a little of my book, or close your eyes. Or you could stare--get the thrill of your life." "She put her hands on her hips. "You really wouldn't care, would you?" "Not really. A bath is a serious business when it's that much trouble. And it's pretty quick in winter." He started to chuckle. "What's so funny?" she asked, a little irritated. "I was just thinking. It's cold enough in here, you might not see that much." Her cheeks went hot, so she pretended not to understand. "But in summer, you can lay in the tub all afternoon?" "In summer, I wash in the creek." He grinned at her. "Why don't you comb the snarls out of your hair? You look like a wild banshee." She stared at him a minute, then said, "Don't flirt with me. It won't do you any good." -Marcie and Ian

All the time, of course, Laura or Mary was minding Baby Carrie, except when she had her afternoon nap. Then they sat and soaked in the sunshine and the wind until Laura forgot that the baby was sleeping. She jumped up and ran and shouted till Ma came to the door and said, “Dear me, Laura, must you yell like an Indian? I declare,” Ma said, “if you girls aren’t getting to look like Indians! Can I never teach you to keep your sunbonnets on?” Pa was up on the house wall beginning the roof. He looked down at them and laughed. “One little Indian, two little Indians, three little Indians,” he sang, softly. “No, only two.” “You make three,” Mary said to him. “You’re brown, too.” “But you aren’t little, Pa,” said Laura.

Her voice was so soothing and gentle that it would have caused an assortment of cobras, tigers, wolverines, and badgers to all snuggle together and take a group nap.

A man gets older, that’s the thing. You don’t know nothin about that, but you will. He gets older and his whole life starts to seem like a dream he had durin an afternoon nap.

Afternoon naps were a custom of the country and never were they so necessary as on the all-day parties, beginning early in the morning and culminating in a ball.

The afternoon sun warms napping cats, without cooking them.

The afternoon sun warms napping cats, without cooking them. (The Revolutionary Phenotype)

I took two-hour naps every afternoon, waking up and realizing "none of this ever happened" as I looked around my mountaintop. The world was upsidedown hanging in an ocean of endless space and here were all these people sitting in theaters watching movies, down there in the world to which I would return. . . .

And no resident in their right mind would go over their heads to the mighty Housing Authority honchos in Manhattan, who did not like their afternoon naps disturbed with minor complaints about ants, toilets, murders, child molestation, rape, heatless apartments, and lead paint that shrunk children’s brains to the size of a full-grown pea in one of their Brooklyn locations, unless they wanted a new home sleeping on a bench at the Port Authority Bus Terminal.

Two jobless grown-ups, we spent weeks wandering around our Brooklyn brownstone in socks and pajamas, ignoring the future, strewing unopened mail across tables and sofas, eating ice cream at ten A.M. and taking thick afternoon naps.

Why can’t I go out?” “You’ve just come in.” “But it’s a sunny day.” “You need a nap.” “I’m not tired.” “You will be later.” “I’ll sleep then.” “But you’ll be grumpy all afternoon if you don’t nap now.” “No, I won’t.” “Yes, you will.

Submitting to a quick nap after a few tasks are completed is the most prominent one. The midday nap is my newest ritual, and now that I have learned the pleasure of slipping into sleep in the afternoon, I will never give it up again.

in such a rush that I tripped over Mirna’s pet pig in the hallway. Oscar grunted and oinked, and even in the darkness I saw the disapproving glare in his piggy eyes. “Fuck you, Oscar, don’t be all judgey,” I whispered. More grunting. “One more look like that and I’ll tell Mirna how you like to dry hump her teddy bear collection during her afternoon nap.” The oinking stopped and he backed away into the bathroom, where I’d set up the giant dog bed he slept on. I flashed him a smug winning look and flipped him off. I

I smoked my first pipe with Seth. I knew the stuff was bad, but I was so tired of being the cop, begging and ragging at him, throwing Pampers in his face when he walked in the door. I wanted to be on the same side again. So I smoked with Seth one afternoon when the girls were napping, and oh my God, I can only think about this for a minute or every part of me will turn into a mouth wanting more: the sexiness of it, fucking Seth like wild for the first time in months, going on even when the girls started to whimper and bang on the door. Then looking out the window and seeing the world shake itself to life: the heavy trees, the sky. And I was back on top. We were going to make it, Seth and I. The voice in my head was back again, telling me stories, too many to write down or even tell one from another.

they appeared from where I stood as peaceful as two lovers who had gaily costumed themselves for an afternoon stroll, but on impulse had decided to lie down and nap, or kiss and make love, or merely whisper to each other of fond matters, and were frozen in this grave and tender embrace forever.

You know how sometimes after an afternoon nap you wake up with the shakes or anxiety? That's what happened to me. I couldn't remember who I was or where I was or what time of year it was or anything. All I knew was that I was. I felt so wide open, so vulnerable, like a great big field that's just been harvested.

Visit cultures that are untouched by electricity and you often see something rather different. Hunter-gatherer tribes, such as the Gabra in northern Kenya or the San people in the Kalahari Desert, whose way of life has changed little over the past thousands of years, sleep in a biphasic pattern. Both these groups take a similarly longer sleep period at night (seven to eight hours of time in bed, achieving about seven hours of sleep), followed by a thirty- to sixty-minute nap in the afternoon.

The afternoon nap, my mother used to say, is the best of all kinds of sleep. One has the best dreams after eating lunch. Yes. I would perspire a little at first and then relax until I felt light as a swallow. Afterward, we’d open the window to let out the stale air and let the fresh air in, together with the green branches of the trees in the garden in Nisantasi, and also to let my dreams escape, because I used to believe that my dreams continued on without me from wherever I left off with them. Maybe the same thing happens when we die, my thoughts floating around the room, inside the furniture, between the shutters closed tight, swirling around and brushing against my table and bed, over the walls and the ceiling, so that somebody slowly cracking open the door would think they saw the shadows of my memories: Shut the door, I don’t want my memories tainted, don’t poison them, just let my thoughts float in here like angels until Judgment Day, beneath my ceiling, in the hush of this house.

Anyway, she loved horses a lot, my mother. When she was growing up she had a horse she said got lonely sometimes? and he liked to come right up to the house and put his head in at the window to see what was going on. “What was his name? “Paintbox.” I’d loved it when my mother told me about the stables back in Kansas: owls and bats in the rafters, horses nickering and blowing. I knew the names of all her childhood horses and dogs. Paintbox! Was he all different colors? “He was spotted, sort of. I’ve seen pictures of him. Sometimes—in the summer—he’d come and look in on her while she was having her afternoon nap. She could hear him breathing, you know, just inside the curtains.

Eight centuries have passed like a nap in the late afternoon my throat is choked with words I cannot speak (from The Last Soldier's Words to Saladin)

According to Imam al-Ghazali, there are four worldly and four spiritual tips to help a person perform tahajjud. The worldly tips are: •Avoid overeating, and over-drinking, which would lead to heavy sleep. •Avoid tiring the body during the day in what is not beneficial. •Take to the afternoon nap, which helps you pray at night. •Never commit sins during the day, which may prevent you from praying tahajjud. The spiritual tips are: •To purify your heart of any resentment against another Muslim. •To constantly have fear in your heart of your Lord and realise that your life is short. •To understand the benefit of tahajjud. •To love Allah, and have strong faith when you stand in prayer in the night, calling upon Allah.

Umm, Ren? We have something important we need to discuss. Meet me on the veranda at sundown, okay?” He froze with his sandwich halfway to his mouth. “A secret rendezvous? On the veranda? At sundown?” He arched an eyebrow at me. “Why, Kelsey, are you trying to seduce me?” “Hardly,” I dryly muttered. He laughed. “Well, I’m all yours. But be gentle with me tonight, fair maiden. I’m new at this whole being human business.” Exasperated, I threw out, “I am not your fair maiden.” He ignored my comment and went back to devouring his lunch. He also took the other half of my discarded peanut butter sandwich and ate that too, commenting, “Hey! This stuff’s pretty good.” Finished, I walked over to the kitchen island and began clearing away Ren’s mess. When he was done eating, he stood to help me. We worked well together. It was almost like we knew what the other person was going to do before he or she did it. The kitchen was spotless in no time. Ren took off his apron and threw it into the laundry basket. Then, he came up behind me while I was putting away some glasses and wrapped his arms around my waist, pulling me up against him. He smelled my hair, kissed my neck, and murmured softly in my ear, “Mmm, definitely peaches and cream, but with a hint of spice. I’ll go be a tiger for a while and take a nap, and then I can save all my hours for you this evening.” I grimaced He was probably expecting a make-out session, and I was planning to break up with him. He wanted to spend time with a girlfriend, and my intention was to explain to him how we weren’t meant to be together. Not that we were ever officially together. Still, it felt like a break-up. Why does this have to be so hard? Ren rocked me and whispered, “’How silver-sweet sound lovers’ tongues by night, Like soft music to attending ears.’” I turned around in his arms, shocked. “How did you remember that? That’s Romeo and Juliet!” He shrugged. “I paid attention when you were reading it to me. I liked it.” He gently kissed my cheek. “See you tonight, iadala,” and left me standing there. The rest of the afternoon, I couldn’t focus on anything. Nothing held my attention for more than a few minutes. I rehearsed some sentences in front of the mirror, but they all sounded pretty lame to me: “It’s not you, it’s me,” “There are plenty of other fish in the sea,” “I need to find myself,” “Our differences are too big,” “I’m not the one,” “There’s someone else.” Heck, I even tried “I’m allergic to cats.

Paul napped comfortably in the afternoon. But he was gravely ill. I started to cry as I watched him sleep. I crept out to our living room where his father's tears joined mine. I already missed him.

In fact, you should take a nap this afternoon, because there won't be much sleep tonight. I mean to have you every way I can. I mean to intoxicate you and torment you so that you know precisely how I feel about you." His finger trailed down her cheek and tipped up her chin. "Don't mistake what is going to happen tonight." His voice was sinful, dark and hoarse. "You will never forget the imprint of my skin after tonight, Esme. Waste your life chitchatting with ladies in lace caps. Raise your child with the help of your precious Sewing Circle. But in the middle of all those lonely nights, you will never, ever, forget the night that lies ahead of us.

Less knows so well the pleasures of youth - danger, excitement, losing oneself in a dark club with a pill, a shot, a stranger's mouth - and, with Robert and his friends, the pleasures of age - comfort and ease, beauty and taste, old friends and old stories and wine, whiskey, sunset over water. His entire life, he has alternated between the two. There is his own distant youth, that daily humiliation of rinsing out your one good shirt and putting on your onw good smile, along with the daily rush of newness: new pleasures, new people, new reflections of yourself. There is Robert's middle age of selecting his vices as carefully as tiles in a Paris shop, napping in the sunlight on an afternoon and getting up from a chair and hearing the creak of death. The city of youth, the country of age. But in between, where Less is living - that exurban existence? How has he never learned to live it?

No mother and daughter in Perdido were closer than Mary Love Caskey and Sister. But it was not to be supposed that either told the other everything she thought or knew. In fact, each of them liked to keep little secrets from the other. Secrets which could be sprung at some opportune moment to produce a grand effect, rather in the manner of a little boy tossing lighted firecrackers beneath his sister's bed while she napped on a hot summer afternoon.

What would yield the greater benefit to mankind: if I spent the afternoon taking stock in my dispensary, or if I went to the beach and took off my clothes and lay in my underpants absorbing the benign spring sun, watching the children frolic in the water, later buying an ice-cream from the kiosk on the parking lot, if the kiosk is still there? What did Noël ultimately achieve labouring at his desk to balance the bodies out against the bodies in? Would he not be better off taking a nap? Maybe the universal sum of happiness would be increased if we declared this afternoon a holiday and went down to the beach, commandant, doctor, chaplain, PT instructors, guards, dog-handlers all together with the six hard cases from the detention block, leaving behind the concussion case to look after things. Perhaps we might meet some girls. For what reason were we waging the war, after all, but to augment the sum of happiness in the universe? Or was I misremembering, was that another war I was thinking of?

I sat this afternoon to read during the boys’ nap. I was going through the botanical theory book, and while I was reading I remembered something Blue Horse said to me back before Gilbert was born. He said wisdom is not a path, it is a tree. At the time I was too busy to give it much thought, so I nodded politely but didn’t pay much attention. Now I see that he was surely right. I have been sad almost a whole year, thinking that taking that test was somehow the end of my learning and that not having that as a possibility in my future left a big empty spot in my life that the children and the ranch didn’t fill. But my life is not like that, it is a tree, and I can stay in one place and spread out in all directions, and I can do more learning shading this brood of mine than if I was all alone. I declare, it is like some other part of me made up some rules about happiness and I just went along with them without thinking. My heart is lightened so much that I am amazed at how sad I felt for so long.

In subsequent experiences I frequently found the mothers of schizophrenic children to be extraordinarily narcissistic individuals like Mrs. X. This is not to say that such mothers are always narcissistic or that narcissistic mothers can’t raise non-schizophrenic children. Schizophrenia is an extremely complex disorder, with obvious genetic as well as environmental determinants. But one can imagine the depth of confusion in Susan’s childhood produced by her mother’s narcissism, and one can objectively see this confusion when actually observing narcissistic mothers interact with their children. On an afternoon when Mrs. X. was feeling sorry for herself Susan might have come home from school bringing some of her paintings the teacher had graded A. If she told her mother proudly how she was progressing in art, Mrs. X. might well respond: “Susan, go take a nap. You shouldn’t get yourself so exhausted over your work in school. The school system is no good anymore. They don’t care for children anymore.” On the other hand, on an afternoon when Mrs. X. was in a very cheerful mood Susan might have come home in tears over the fact that she had been bullied by several boys on the school bus, and Mrs. X. could say: “Isn’t it fortunate that Mr. Jones is such a good bus driver? He is so nice and patient with all you children and your roughhousing. I think you should be sure to give him a nice little present at Christmastime.” Since they do not perceive others as others but only as extensions of themselves, narcissistic

She needed time to reflect, to figure out the possibilities resulting from her interaction with the Shesbow twins. This meant journaling. And fiction. With her father home from work early and the new dog and everything, it felt like a day out of time, a holiday- so why not spend the afternoon writing up her latest ideas for Never Land? She would indulge herself, the same way other girls did with naps, baths, and dresses. She had been playing with the idea of linking all her stories together somehow, maybe into a novel...

This passenger was wondering why he had stolen a big grey suitcase on four wheels. Was it because he could and because the owner was a lout, or because the suitcase might contain a pair of shoes and even a hat? Or was it because the old man didn’t have anything to lose? Allan really couldn’t say why he did it. When life has gone into overtime it’s easy to take liberties, he thought, and he made himself comfortable in the seat. So far, Allan was satisfied with the way the day had developed. Then he closed his eyes for his afternoon nap.

a middle-aged lady in a small country town, by doing no more than yield whole-hearted obedience to her own irresistible eccentricities, and to a spirit of mischief engendered by the utter idleness of her existence, could see, without ever having given a thought to Louis XIV, the most trivial occupations of her daily life, her morning toilet, her luncheon, her afternoon nap, assume, by virtue of their despotic singularity, something of the interest that was to be found in what Saint-Simon used to call the ‘machinery’ of life at Versailles;

Vigilance breaks prevent deadly mistakes. Restorative breaks enhance performance. Lunches and naps help us elude the trough and get more and better work done in the afternoon. A growing body of science makes it clear: Breaks are not a sign of sloth but a sign of strength.

Scarlett felt that the time for prayer had passed. If God had seen fit to punish them so, then God could very well do without prayers. Religion had always been a bargaining process with Scarlett. She promised God good behavior in exchange for favors. God had broken the bargain time and again, to her way of thinking, and she felt that she owed Him nothing at all now. And whenever she found Carreen on her knees when she should have been taking an afternoon nap or doing the mending, she felt that Carreen was shirking her share of the burdens.

My own schedule is pretty clear-cut. Mornings belong to whatever is new – the current composition. Afternoons are for naps and letters. Evenings are for reading, family, Red Sox games on TV, an any revisions that just cannot wait. Basically mornings are my prime writing time.

Well and all, he would burn that bridge when he came to it, he decided, and for now he would take Yvaine into the village and deal with events as they came. He felt his spirits lift, and his time as a dormouse had already become nothing more in his head than the remnants of a dream, as if he had merely taken an afternoon nap in front of the kitchen fire and was now wide awake once more. He could almost taste in his mouth the memory of Mr. Bromios’s best ale, although he realized, with a guilty start, he had forgotten the color of Victoria Forester’s eyes.

Both you and the meeting attendees are falling prey to an evolutionarily imprinted lull in wakefulness that favors an afternoon nap, called the post-prandial alertness dip (from the Latin prandium, “meal”). This brief descent from high-degree wakefulness to low-level alertness reflects an innate drive to be asleep and napping in the afternoon, and not working. It appears to be a normal part of the daily rhythm of life. Should you ever have to give a presentation at work, for your own sake—and that of the conscious state of your listeners—if you can, avoid the midafternoon slot.

Who here today is the parent of an unsaved child, a rebellious child who has left the colony or who has claimed not to be a believer? Several hands were raised. The substitute bishop then directed his next question to these individuals who had raised their hands. If you love your children and you believe they are literally going to burn in the flames of hell for all eternity when they die, how can you sit here in this room calmly? How can you go to your home and enjoy a nice lunch of vreninkje and platz prepared by your wife and then settle into your warm bed with your feather comforter for a relaxing maddachschlop—afternoon nap—knowing that your child will soon be burning forever, screaming in agony, eternal pain? If you truly believed this, wouldn’t you be doing everything in your power to get them to repent, to accept Jesus Christ into their hearts, to be forgiven? Wouldn’t you be scouring the earth trying to find these wayward children, the ones who have left the colony, or who have been forced to leave the colony, the ones roaming the proverbial desert, the ones you deem to be sinners, but are still your children, your flesh and blood, your precious babies?

I reached out to hold a daydream. They looked like they were spun from glass and yet their touch was silk-soft. As they drifted between my fingers, I felt them—a nap in the sleepy sunshine of a winter afternoon, a reverie where a sea alight with flowers and bright candles washed over my ankles.

What Claire could do with the edible flowers that grew around the cranky apple tree in the backyard was the stuff of legend. Everyone knew that if you got Claire to cater your anniversary party, she would make aioli sauce with nasturtiums and tulip cups filled with orange salad, and everyone would leave the party feeling both jealous and aroused. And if you got her to cater your child's birthday party, she would serve tiny strawberry cupcakes and candied violets and the children would all be well behaved and would take long afternoon naps. Claire had a true magic to her cooking when she used her flowers.

Mr. Severin smiled, tiny constellations of reflected chandelier lights glinting in his eyes. "Since I've told you about my tastes... what are yours?" Cassandra looked down at her folded hands in her lap. "I like trivial things, mostly," she said with a self-deprecating laugh. "Handiwork, such as embroidery, knitting, and needlepoint. I sketch and paint a little. I like naps and teatime, and taking a lazy stroll on a sunny day, and reading books on a rainy afternoon. But I would like two have my own family someday, and... I want to help other people far more than I'm able to now. I take baskets of food and medicine to tenants and acquaintances in the village, but that's not enough. I want to provide real help to people who need it." She sighed shortly. "I suppose that's not very interesting. Pandora's the exciting, amusing twin, the one people remember. I've always been... well, the one who's not Pandora.

Sometimes I can still sleep it off, my fear. My dreams are gentle now even when they are about being mugged, robbed and knocked down, even when I am pressing my car key into a bit of yielding earth. But often in the afternoons I wake after a nap with an awful sense of its being over and that it never meant much; I never had a life. The valuable sweetness and the hard work are infected by the fact of death: they no longer seem to have been so wonderful, but they are all I had. And then I want to be comforted. I want my old, unthreatening forms of silence, and comedy-and-cowardice. I want breath and stories and the world.

In that distant beginning season, Sun Man's warm magic flowed over all the land. Whenever he raised his arms, it was day. whenever he lowered them, it was night. The Bee People and the Elephant People and the Tic People loved the rhythm of Sun Man's light. Their faces crinkled with pleasure in his heat. But inside the dreamtime, Sun Man grew old. His back grew stiff and his knee joints ached. He rose later and later each morning. He napped soon after breakfast and went to bed in the afternoon. "What's going on here?" complained Grandfather Mantis. "I'm not getting heat anymore." Grandfather Mantis sent the Bird People to find out. The Bird People returned, rumpled and solemn. Darkness was everywhere, even though it was supposed to be daytime. "Sun Man is getting old," they explained. "This shining all the time is getting too much for him." "Well, I'm old," snapped Grandfather Mantis. "Doesn't stop me." His wife raised her eyebrows but said nothing.

They call each other ‘E.’ Elvis picks wildflowers near the river and brings them to Emily. She explains half-rhymes to him. In heaven Emily wears her hair long, sports Levis and western blouses with rhinestones. Elvis is lean again, wears baggy trousers and T-shirts, a letterman’s jacket from Tupelo High. They take long walks and often hold hands. She prefers they remain just friends. Forever. Emily’s poems now contain naugahyde, Cadillacs, Electricity, jets, TV, Little Richard and Richard Nixon. The rock-a-billy rhythm makes her smile. Elvis likes himself with style. This afternoon he will play guitar and sing “I Taste A Liquor Never Brewed” to the tune of “Love Me Tender.” Emily will clap and harmonize. Alone in their cabins later, they’ll listen to the river and nap. They will not think of Amherst or Las Vegas. They know why God made them roommates. It’s because America was their hometown. It’s because God is a thing without feathers. It’s because God wears blue suede shoes.

Winston Churchill, who abhorred laziness in other people, himself took a nap every afternoon. He defended his afternoon doze in practical terms as an absolute necessity: You must sleep sometime between lunch and dinner, and no halfway measures. Take off your clothes and get into bed. That’s what I always do. Don’t think you will be doing less work because you sleep during the day. That’s a foolish notion held by people who have no imagination. You will be able to accomplish more. You get two days in one—well, at least one and a half, I’m sure. When the war started, I had to sleep during the day because that was the only way I could cope with my responsibilities.

The temptation to quit was a traitor. It would not barge in boldly during the peak of my workload; often I was too preoccupied to contemplate on the dismal state of my personal life. Instead, it would reemerge during that silent minute in between surgeries, as I slumped on the floor and waited for the next patient to be brought in. It stared at me from a corner as I waited for the elevator doors to open, me holding both stretcher bed and oxygen tank and it's only an hour past midnight. It would whisper in my ear, to wake me up from a nap on the first Sunday afternoon that I got to spend at home in a long time. It would hold open my apartment door, as I donned my white coat, grabbed my keys, and rushed to morning ward rounds.

I’ve always enjoyed sherry at room temperature on a summer afternoon. I’m not fond of cold drinks on hot days. I’ll take a drink of sherry and, a little later, lie down for a nap, and fall asleep before I know it. When I wake up, some of the day’s heat is gone. I hope I can die that way—drink a little sherry on a summer afternoon, stretch out on a sofa, drop off to sleep, and never wake up.

I never felt at Home—Below—- And in the Handsome Skies I shall not feel at Home—I know— I don't like Paradise— Because it's Sunday—all the time— And Recess—never comes— And Eden'll be so lonesome Bright Wednesday Afternoons— If God could make a visit— Or ever took a Nap— So not to see us—but they say Himself—a Telescope Perennial beholds us— Myself would run away From Him—and Holy Ghost—and All— But there's the "Judgement Day"!

THE Andersons lived in a lovely clapboard house at the corner of Washington and Main, a few blocks past the hubbub of stores and businesses, where the town settled into private residences for the well-to-do. Beyond the wide front porch, where Mr. and Mrs. Anderson liked to sit in the evenings, the man scooping into his silk tobacco pouch and the woman squinting at her needlework, were the parlor, dining room, and kitchen. Bessie spent most of her time on that first floor, chasing after the children, preparing meals, and tidying up. At the top of the staircase were the bedrooms—Maisie and little Raymond shared theirs—and the second washroom. Raymond took a long nap in the afternoon and Bessie liked to sit in the window seat as he settled into his dreams. She could just make out the top two floors of the Griffin Building, with its white cornices that blazed in the sunlight.

Less knows so well the pleasures of youth— danger, excitement, losing oneself in a dark club with a pill, a shot, a stranger’s mouth—and, with Robert and his friends, the pleasures of age—comfort and ease, beauty and taste, old friends and old stories and wine, whiskey, sunsets over the water. His entire life, he has alternated between the two. There is his own distant youth, that daily humiliation of rinsing out your one good shirt and putting on your one good smile, along with the daily rush of newness: new pleasures, new people, new reflections of yourself. There is Robert’s late middle age of selecting vices as carefully as ties in a Paris shop, napping in the sunlight on an afternoon and getting up from a chair and hearing the creak of death. The city of youth, the country of age. But in between, where Less is living— that exurban existence? How has he never learned to live it?

It's weird not being in our subculture of two any more. There was Jen's culture, her little habits and ways of doing things; the collection of stuff she'd already learnt she loved before we met me. Chorizo and Jonathan Franken and long walks and the Eagles (her dad). Seeing the Christmas lights. Taylor Swift, frying pans in the dishwasher, the works absolutely, arsewipe, heaven. Tracy Chapman and prawn jalfrezi and Muriel Spark and HP sauce in bacon sandwiches. And then there was my culture. Steve Martin and Aston Villa and New York and E.T. Chicken bhuna, strange-looking cats and always having squash or cans of soft drinks in the house. The Cure. Pink Floyd. Kanye West, friend eggs, ten hours' sleep, ketchup in bacon sandwiches. Never missing dental check-ups. Sister Sledge (my mum). Watching TV even if the weather is nice. Cadbury's Caramel. John and Paul and George and Ringo. And then we met and fell in love and we introduced each other to all of it, like children showing each other their favourite toys. The instinct never goes - look at my fire engine, look at my vinyl collection. Look at all these things I've chosen to represent who I am. It was fun to find out about each other's self-made cultures and make our own hybrid in the years of eating, watching, reading, listening, sleeping and living together. Our culture was tea drink from very large mugs. And looking forward to the Glastonbury ticket day and the new season of Game of Thrones and taking the piss out of ourselves for being just like everyone else. Our culture was over-tipping in restaurants because we both used to work in the service industry, salty popcorn at the cinema and afternoon naps. Side-by-side morning sex. Home-made Manhattans. Barmade Manhattans (much better). Otis Redding's "Cigarettes and Coffee" (our song). Discovering a new song we both loved and listening to it over and over again until we couldn't listen to it any more. Period dramas on a Sunday night. That one perfect vibrator that finished her off in seconds when we were in a rush. Gravy. David Hockney. Truffle crisps. Can you believe it? I still can't believe it. A smell indisputably reminiscent of bums. On a crisp. And yet we couldn't get enough of them together - stuffing them in our gobs, her hand on my chest, me trying not to get crumbs in her hair as we watched Sense and Sensibility (1995). But I'm not a member of that club anymore. No one is. It's been disbanded, dissolved, the domain is no longer valid. So what do I do with all its stuff? Where so I put it all? Where do I take all my new discoveries now I'm no longer a tribe of two? And if I start a new sub-genre of love with someone else, am I allowed to bring in all the things I loved from the last one? Or would that be weird? Why do I find this so hard?

There was once a businessman who was sitting by the beach in a small Brazilian village. As he sat, he saw a Brazilian fisherman rowing a small boat toward the shore having caught quite a few big fish. The businessman was impressed and asked the fisherman, “How long does it take you to catch so many fish?” The fisherman replied, “Oh, just a short while.” “Then why don’t you stay longer at sea and catch even more?” The businessman was astonished. “This is enough to feed my whole family,” the fisherman said. The businessman then asked, “So, what do you do for the rest of the day?” The fisherman replied, “Well, I usually wake up early in the morning, go out to sea and catch a few fish, then go back and play with my kids. In the afternoon, I take a nap with my wife, and [when] evening comes, I join my buddies in the village for a drink—we play guitar, sing and dance throughout the night.” The businessman offered a suggestion to the fisherman. “I am a PhD in business management. I could help you to become a more successful person. From now on, you should spend more time at sea and try to catch as many fish as possible. When you have saved enough money, you could buy a bigger boat and catch even more fish. Soon you will be able to afford to buy more boats, set up your own company, your own production plant for canned food and distribution network. By then, you will have moved out of this village and to São Paulo, where you can set up an HQ to manage your other branches.” The fisherman continues, “And after that?” The businessman laughs heartily. “After that, you can live like a king in your own house, and when the time is right, you can go public and float your shares in the Stock Exchange, and you will be rich.” The fisherman asks, “And after that?” The businessman says, “After that, you can finally retire, you can move to a house by the fishing village, wake up early in the morning, catch a few fish, then return home to play with [your] kids, have a nice afternoon nap with your wife, and when evening comes, you can join your buddies for a drink, play the guitar, sing and dance throughout the night!” The fisherman was puzzled. “Isn’t that what I am doing now?

This is a friendly forty winks, Mrs. FitzEngle.” He snagged her wrist. “Join me.” She regarded him where he lay. “Ellen.” The teasing tone in Val’s voice faded. “I will not ravish you in broad daylight unless you ask it of me, though I would hold you.” She nodded uncertainly and gingerly lowered herself beside him, flat on her back. “You’re out of practice,” Val observed, rolling to his side. “We must correct this state of affairs if we’re to get our winks.” Before she could protest, he arranged her so she was on her side as well, his body curved around hers, her head resting on his bicep, his arm tucking her back against him. “The benefit of this position,” his said, speaking very close to her ear, “is that I cannot behold your lovely face if you want to confide secrets, you see? I am close enough to hear you whisper, but you have a little privacy, as well. So confide away, and I’ll just cuddle up and perhaps even drift off.” “You would drift off while I’m confiding?” “I would allow you the fiction. It’s one of the rules of gentlemanly conduct owed on summer days to napping companions.” His arm was loosely draped over her middle so he could sense the tension in her. “I can hear your thoughts turning like a mill wheel. Let your mind rest too, Ellen.” “I am unused to this friendly napping.” “You and your baron never stole off for an afternoon nap?” Val asked, his fingers tracing the length of her arm. “Never kidnapped each other for a picnic on a pretty day?” “We did not.” Ellen sighed as his fingers stroked over her arm again. “He occasionally took tea with me, though, and we often visited at the end of the day.” But, Val concluded with some satisfaction, they did not visit in bed or on blankets or with their clothes off. Ellen had much to learn about napping. His right hand drifted up to her shoulder, where he experimentally squeezed at the muscles joining her neck to her back. “Blazes,” he whispered, “you are strong. Relax, Ellen.” His right hand was more than competent to knead at her tense muscles, and when he heard her sigh and felt her relax, he realized he’d found the way to stop her mill wheel from spinning so relentlessly. “Close your eyes, Ellen,” he instructed softly. “Close your eyes and rest.” In minutes, her breathing evened out, her body went slack, and sleep claimed her. Gathering her a little more closely, he planted a kiss on her nape and closed his eyes. His hand wasn’t throbbing anymore, his belly was full, and he was stealing a few private moments with a pretty lady on a pretty day. God

That's the spirit, kid," said the voice of the grown man. "Come on, Snow Scouts, let's all say the Snow Scout Alphabet Pledge together." Instantly the cave echoed with the sound of many voices speaking in perfect unison, a phrase here which means "reciting a list of very odd words at the very same time." "Snow Scouts," recited the Snow Scouts, "are accommodating, basic, calm, darling, emblematic, frisky, grinning, human, innocent, jumping, kept, limited, meek, nap-loving, official, pretty, quarantines, recent, scheduled, tidy, understandable, victorious, wholesome, xylophone, young, and zippered - every morning, every afternoon, every night, and all day long!

maybe he hasn’t been judging Carl for other reasons. Maybe Owen doesn’t judge him because Carl returns the favor, by not judging a secret Owen felt safe confiding in Carl. Even if that theory is wrong, I still need to talk to him. Because Carl’s also the only lawyer I know in town. I knock on the front door, but no one answers. Not Carl, not Patty. It’s odd because Carl works from home. He likes to be around for his kids—his two young kids—who usually nap at this time. Carl and Patty are sticklers for their children’s schedule. Patty lectured me about it during our first night out together. Patty had just celebrated her twenty-eighth birthday, which made the lecture all the more enjoyable. If I was still able to have children—that was how she said it—I was going to have to be careful not to let them rule the roost. I’d have to show them who was in charge. That meant a schedule. That meant, in her case, a 12:30 P.M. nap every day. It’s 12:45. If Carl isn’t home, why isn’t Patty? Except that through the living room blinds, I see that Carl is home. I see him standing there, hiding behind those blinds, waiting for me to go. I knock on the door again, pressing hard on the doorbell. I’m going to ring the doorbell for the rest of the afternoon until he lets me in. Kids’ naps be damned. Carl swings the door open. He is holding a beer; his hair is neatly combed. Those are the first indicators that something strange is going on. His hair is usually uncombed,

without having to pay for them with your eyeteeth’, ‘All yours for $58. You’re a lucky man, Mr Veteran.’ The homes sold hand over fist. In that strange, intermediate world between country and city, men and women forged countless alliances, exploring peace together. ‘In front of almost every house along Levittown’s 100 miles of winding streets sits a tricycle or a baby carriage,’ a report for Time magazine noted in the summer of 1950. ‘In Levittown, all activity stops from 12 to 2 in the afternoon; that is nap time.’ Levittown marked the start of the explosive growth of suburbia, a concept that stands for an entire culture, a specific kind of life and society. To countless GIs suburbia was the beginning of modern life, of ‘time for things like

I do not know the substance of the considerations and recommendations which Dr. Szilárd proposes to submit to you,” Einstein wrote. “The terms of secrecy under which Dr. Szilárd is working at present do not permit him to give me information about his work; however, I understand that he now is greatly concerned about the lack of adequate contact between scientists who are doing this work and those members of your Cabinet who are responsible for formulating policy.”34 Roosevelt never read the letter. It was found in his office after he died on April 12 and was passed on to Harry Truman, who in turn gave it to his designated secretary of state, James Byrnes. The result was a meeting between Szilárd and Byrnes in South Carolina, but Byrnes was neither moved nor impressed. The atom bomb was dropped, with little high-level debate, on August 6, 1945, on the city of Hiroshima. Einstein was at the cottage he rented that summer on Saranac Lake in the Adirondacks, taking an afternoon nap. Helen Dukas informed him when he came down for tea. “Oh, my God,” is all he said.35 Three days later, the bomb was used again, this time on Nagasaki. The following day, officials in Washington released a long history, compiled by Princeton physics professor Henry DeWolf Smyth, of the secret endeavor to build the weapon. The Smyth report, much to Einstein’s lasting discomfort, assigned great historic weight for the launch of the project to the 1939 letter he had written to Roosevelt. Between the influence imputed to that letter and the underlying relationship between energy and mass that he had formulated forty years earlier, Einstein became associated in the popular imagination with the making of the atom bomb, even though his involvement was marginal. Time put him on its cover, with a portrait showing a mushroom cloud erupting behind him with E=mc2 emblazoned on it. In a story that was overseen by an editor named Whittaker Chambers, the magazine noted with its typical prose flair from the period: Through the incomparable blast and flame that will follow, there will be dimly discernible, to those who are interested in cause & effect in history, the features of a shy, almost saintly, childlike little man with the soft brown eyes, the drooping facial lines of a world-weary hound, and hair like an aurora borealis… Albert Einstein did not work directly on the atom bomb. But Einstein was the father of the bomb in two important ways: 1) it was his initiative which started U.S. bomb research; 2) it was his equation (E = mc2) which made the atomic bomb theoretically possible.36 It was a perception that plagued him. When Newsweek did a cover on him, with the headline “The Man Who Started It All,” Einstein offered a memorable lament. “Had I known that the Germans would not succeed in producing an atomic bomb,” he said, “I never would have lifted a finger.”37 Of course, neither he nor Szilárd nor any of their friends involved with the bomb-building effort, many of them refugees from Hitler’s horrors, could know that the brilliant scientists they had left behind in Berlin, such as Heisenberg, would fail to unlock the secrets. “Perhaps I can be forgiven,” Einstein said a few months before his death in a conversation with Linus Pauling, “because we all felt that there was a high probability that the Germans were working on this problem and they might succeed and use the atomic bomb and become the master race.”38

If you happened to find yourself at the foot of the stairs in the White House on a typical afternoon sometime around 1804 or 1805, you might have noticed a perky bird in a pearl-gray coat ascending the steps behind Thomas Jefferson, hop by hop, as the president retired to his chambers for a siesta. This was Dick. Although the president didn’t dignify his pet mockingbird with one of the fancy Celtic or Gallic names he gave his horses and sheepdogs—Cucullin, Fingal, Bergère—still it was a favorite pet. “I sincerely congratulate you on the arrival of the Mocking bird,” Jefferson wrote to his son-in-law, who had informed him of the advent of the first resident mockingbird. “Learn all the children to venerate it as a superior being in the form of a bird.” Dick may well have been one of the two mockingbirds Jefferson bought in 1803. These were pricier than most pet birds ($10 or $15 then—around $125 now) because their serenades included not only renditions of all the birds of the local woods, but also popular American, Scottish, and French songs. Not everyone would pick this bird for a friend. Wordsworth called him the “merry mockingbird.” Brash, yes. Saucy and animated. But merry? His most common call is a bruising tschak!—a kind of unlovely avian expletive that one naturalist described as a cross between a snort of disgust and a hawking of phlegm. But Jefferson adored Dick for his uncommon intelligence, his musicality, and his remarkable ability to mimic. As the president’s friend Margaret Bayard Smith wrote, “Whenever he was alone he opened the cage and let the bird fly about the room. After flitting for a while from one object to another, it would alight on his table and regale him with its sweetest notes, or perch on his shoulder and take its food from his lips.” When the president napped, Dick would sit on his couch and serenade him with both bird and human tunes.

When we arrived in England, we could almost feel the excitement in the air. Banners, pictures, and other decorations hung everywhere, and the streets were packed with people waiting to celebrate the wedding of the century. The formal party in honor of the royal match was held on the evening of Monday, July 27--two nights before the wedding. That day I felt nervous with anticipation as I lunched with a friend and went to the hairdresser. Pat met Exxon colleagues for lunch near their office in Mayfair. As he described our plans for the upcoming ball and wedding, Pat began to feel totally overwhelmed by the importance and glamour of these royal events. So my darling husband excused himself, walked over to Green Park just across from the palace, and simply collapsed with nervous strain to nap on a quiet patch of grass for the afternoon. I’ve always envied his ability to tune out and relax when he’s under stress; I get tense and can’t eat or sleep.

Right,” he said, “As you well know, humans are biologically programmed to sleep twice a day—a siesta in the afternoon, then eight hours of sleep at night.” She nodded. “Except most of us skip the siesta because our jobs demand it. And when I say most of us, I really just mean Americans. Mexico doesn’t have this problem, nor does France or Italy or any of those other countries that drink even more than we do at lunch. Still, the fact remains: human productivity naturally drops in the afternoon. In TV, this is referred to as the Afternoon Depression Zone. Too late to get anything meaningful done; too early to go home. Doesn’t matter if you’re a homemaker, a fourth grader, a bricklayer, a businessman—no one is immune. Between the hours of one thirty-one and four forty-four p.m., productive life as we know it ceases to exist. It’s a virtual death zone.” Elizabeth raised an eyebrow. “And although I said it affects everyone,” he continued, “it’s an especially dangerous time for the homemaker. Because unlike a fourth grader who can put off her homework, or a businessman who can pretend to be listening, the homemaker must force herself to keep going. She has to get the kids down for a nap because if she doesn’t, the evening will be hell. She has to mop the floor because if she doesn’t, someone could slip on the spilled milk. She has to run to the store because if she doesn’t, there will be nothing to eat. By the way,” he said, pausing, “have you ever noticed how women always say they need to run to the store? Not walk, not go, not stop by. Run. That’s what I mean. The homemaker is operating at an insane level of hyperproductivity. And even though she’s in way over her head, she still has to make dinner. It’s not sustainable, Elizabeth. She’s going to have a heart attack or a stroke, or at the very least be in a foul mood. And it’s all because she can’t procrastinate like her fourth grader or pretend to be doing something like her husband. She’s forced to be productive despite the fact that she’s in a potentially fatal time zone—the Afternoon Depression Zone.” “It’s classic neurogenic deprivation,” Elizabeth said, nodding.

I'm only a ‘Miss,’” she informed him, having listened to their discussion of the peerage. “But when I marry a prince someday, I'll be ‘Princess Rose,’ and then you may call me ‘Your Highness.’” Bronson laughed, his tension seeming to dispel. “You're already a princess,” he said, scooping the little girl up and setting her on his knee. Caught by surprise, Rose let out a squealing laugh. “No, I'm not! I don't have a crown!” Bronson appeared to take the point seriously. “What kind of crown would you like, Princess Rose?” “Well, let me think…” Rose screwed up her small face in deep concentration. “Silver?” Bronson prompted. “Gold? With colored stones, or pearls?” “Rose does not need a crown,” Holly intervened with a touch of alarm, realizing that Bronson was more than ready to purchase some ostentatious headpiece for the child. “Back to play, Rose—unless you would care to take an afternoon nap, in which case I'll ring for Maude.” “Oh, no, I don't want a nap,” the little girl said, immediately sliding from Bronson's knee. “May I have another cake, Mama?” Holly smiled fondly and shook her head. “No, you may not. You'll spoil your dinner.” “Oh, Mama, can't I have just one more? One of the little ones?” “I've just said no, Rose. Now please play quietly while Mr. Bronson and I finish our discussion.” Obeying reluctantly, Rose glanced back at Bronson. “Why is your nose crooked, Mr. Bronson?” “Rose,” Holly reproved sharply. “You know very well that we never make observations about a person's appearance.” However, Bronson answered the child with a grin. “I ran into something once.” “A door?” The child guessed. “A wall?” “A hard left hook.” “Oh.” Rose stared at him contemplatively. “What does that mean?” “It's a fighting term.” “Fighting is bad,” the little girl said firmly. “Very, very bad.” “Yes, I know.” Lowering his head, Bronson tried to look chastened, but his air of repentance was far from convincing. “Rose,” Holly said in a warning tone. “There'll be no further interruptions, I hope.” “No, Mama.” Obediently the child returned to her play area. As she walked behind Bronson's chair, he surreptitiously handed her another cake. Grabbing the tidbit, Rose hurried to the corner like a furtive squirrel.

Okay,” I said. “Okay, I’ll watch these kids. I’ll be their . . . what did you call it?” “Governess,” she said, delighted. “Yeah, I’ll be that.” “I promise you that I will never forget this. Never.” “I’d better get home,” I said. “Is Carl gone? Can somebody drive me to the bus station?” “No,” Madison said, shaking her head, standing up. “You aren’t going home tonight. You’re staying here. You’ll spend the night. In fact, you don’t have to go home if you don’t want to. We’re buying you everything you need. All new clothes! The best computer. Whatever you want.” “Okay,” I said, so tired all of a sudden. “What do you want for dinner tonight? Our cook can make anything.” “I don’t know,” I said. “Maybe pizza or something like that.” “We have a pizza oven!” she said. “The best pizza you’ve ever had.” We stared at each other. It was three in the afternoon. What did we do until dinner? “Is Timothy still napping?” I asked, trying to break the awkwardness. “Oh, yeah, I’d better go check on him. Do you want a drink or anything?” “Maybe I can take a nap?” I asked. I barely took note of how huge the house was now that I was able to move through it. We went up a spiral staircase, like in some big-budget musical. Madison was telling me some nonsense about how during the Civil War they took horses up these stairs and hid them in the attic from the Union army. It’s possible I imagined this, some kind of fever dream in the aftermath of making a life-altering decision.

These days, the Lowe brothers knew better than to tempt the town’s wrath, but that didn’t stop them from sneaking over the fence in the throes of night, relishing the taste of some reckless thrill. “Do you hear that?” The older one, Hendry Lowe, stood up, brushed the forest floor off his gray T-shirt, and cracked each of his knuckles, one by one. “That’s the sound of rules breaking.” Hendry Lowe was too pretty to worry about rules. His nose was freckled from afternoons napping in sunshine. His dark curls kissed his ears and cheekbones, overgrown from months between haircuts. His clothes smelled sweet from morning pastries often stuffed in his pockets. Hendry Lowe was also too charming to play a villain. The younger brother, Alistair, leapt from the fence and crashed gracelessly to the ground. He didn’t like forgoing the use of magick, because without it he was never very good at anything—even an action as simple as landing. But tonight he had no magick to waste. “Do you hear that?” Alistair echoed, smirking as he rose to his feet. “That’s the sound of bones breaking.” Although the two brothers looked alike, Alistair wore the Lowe features far differently than Hendry. Pale skin from a lifetime spent indoors, eyes the color of cigarette ashes, a widow’s peak as sharp as a blade. He wore a wool sweater in September because he was perpetually cold. He carried the Sunday crossword in his pocket because he was perpetually bored. He was one year younger than Hendry, a good deal more powerful, and a great deal more wicked. Alistair Lowe played the perfect villain. Not because he was instinctively cruel or openly proud, but because, sometimes, he liked to.

Children.” Westcliff’s sardonic voice caused them both to look at him blankly. He was standing from his chair and stretching underused muscles. “I’m afraid this has gone on long enough for me. You are welcome to continue playing, but I beg to take leave.” “But who will arbitrate?” Daisy protested. “Since no one has been keeping score for at least a half hour,” the earl said dryly, “there is no further need for my judgement.” “Yes we have,” Daisy argued, and turned to Swift. “What is the score?” “I don’t know.” As their gazes held, Daisy could hardly restrain a snicker of sudden embarrassment. Amusement glittered in Swift’s eyes. “I think you won,” he said. “Oh, don’t condescend to me,” Daisy said. “You’re ahead. I can take a loss. It’s part of the game.” “I’m not being condescending. It’s been point-for-point for at least…” Swift fumbled in the pocket of his waistcoat and pulled out a watch. “…two hours.” “Which means that in all likelihood you preserved your early lead.” “But you chipped away at it after the third round—” “Oh, hell’s bells!” came Lillian’s voice from the sidelines. She sounded thoroughly aggravated, having gone into the manor for a nap and come out to find them still at the bowling green. “You’ve quarreled all afternoon like a pair of ferrets, and now you’re fighting over who won. If someone doesn’t put a stop to it, you’ll be squabbling out here ‘til midnight. Daisy, you’re covered with dust and your hair is a bird’s nest. Come inside and put yourself to rights. Now.” “There’s no need to shout,” Daisy replied mildly, following her sister’s retreating figure. She glanced over her shoulder at Matthew Swift…a friendlier glance than she had ever given him before, then turned and quickened her pace. Swift began to pick up the wooden bowls. “Leave them,” Westcliff said. “The servants will put things in order. Your time is better spent preparing yourself for supper, which will commence in approximately one hour.” Obligingly Matthew dropped the bowls and went toward the house with Westcliff. He watched Daisy’s small, sylphlike form until she disappeared from sight. Westcliff did not miss Matthew’s fascinated gaze. “You have a unique approach to courtship,” he commented. “I wouldn’t have thought beating Daisy at lawn games would catch her interest, but it seems to have done the trick.” Matthew contemplated the ground before his feet, schooling his tone into calm unconcern. “I’m not courting Miss Bowman.” “Then it seems I misinterpreted your apparent passion for bowls.” Matthew shot him a defensive glance. “I’ll admit, I find her entertaining. But that doesn’t mean I want to marry her.” “The Bowman sisters are rather dangerous that way. When one of them first attracts your interest, all you know is she’s the most provoking creature you’ve ever encountered. But then you discover that as maddening as she is, you can scarcely wait until the next time you see her. Like the progression of an incurable disease, it spreads from one organ to the next. The craving begins. All other women begin to seem colorless and dull in comparison. You want her until you think you’ll go mad from it. You can’t stop thinking—” “I have no idea what you’re talking about,” Matthew interrupted, turning pale. He was not about to succumb to an incurable disease. A man had choices in life. And no matter what Westcliff believed, this was nothing more than a physical urge. An unholy powerful, gut-wrenching, insanity-producing physical urge…but it could be conquered by sheer force of will. “If you say so,” Westcliff said, sounding unconvinced.

She picked through the bits of jewelry, the stud earrings and ruby ring that belonged to their mother, Shirin. There was something almost meditative about this ritual of hers, combing through the photos and small keepsakes, even if she touched on some painful memories. It was as if her fingers were actually tracing the milestones each piece represented. Her hand closed on a smooth, round object, something resembling a marble egg. It was a miniature bar of lotus soap, still in its wrapper, bought on their last trip to the 'hammam'. The public bathhouse had been a favorite spot of theirs, a place the three of them liked to go to on Thursdays, the day before the Iranian weekend. Marjan held the soap to her nose. She took a deep breath, inhaling the downy scent of mornings spent washing and scrubbing with rosewater and lotus products. All at once she heard the laughter once again, the giggles of women making the bathing ritual a party more than anything else. The 'hammam' they had attended those last years in Iran was situated near their apartment in central Tehran. Although not as palatial as the turquoise and golden-domed bathhouse of their childhood, it was still a grand building of hot pools and steamy balconies, a place of gossip and laughter. The women of the neighborhood would gather there weekly to untangle their long hair with tortoiseshell combs and lotus powder, a silky conditioner that left locks gleaming like onyx uncovered. For pocket change, a 'dalak' could be hired by the hour. These bathhouse attendants, matronly and humorous for all their years spent whispering local chatter, would scrub at tired limbs with loofahs and mitts of woven Caspian seaweed. Massages and palm readings accompanied platters of watermelon and hot jasmine tea, the afternoons whiled away with naps and dips in the perfumed aqueducts regulated according to their hot and cold properties.

Stick to a sleep schedule. Go to bed and wake up at the same time each day. As creatures of habit, people have a hard time adjusting to changes in sleep patterns. Sleeping later on weekends won’t fully make up for a lack of sleep during the week and will make it harder to wake up early on Monday morning. Set an alarm for bedtime. Often we set an alarm for when it’s time to wake up but fail to do so for when it’s time to go to sleep. If there is only one piece of advice you remember and take from these twelve tips, this should be it. Exercise is great, but not too late in the day. Try to exercise at least thirty minutes on most days but not later than two to three hours before your bedtime. Avoid caffeine and nicotine. Coffee, colas, certain teas, and chocolate contain the stimulant caffeine, and its effects can take as long as eight hours to wear off fully. Therefore, a cup of coffee in the late afternoon can make it hard for you to fall asleep at night. Nicotine is also a stimulant, often causing smokers to sleep only very lightly. In addition, smokers often wake up too early in the morning because of nicotine withdrawal. Avoid alcoholic drinks before bed. Having a nightcap or alcoholic beverage before sleep may help you relax, but heavy use robs you of REM sleep, keeping you in the lighter stages of sleep. Heavy alcohol ingestion also may contribute to impairment in breathing at night. You also tend to wake up in the middle of the night when the effects of the alcohol have worn off. Avoid large meals and beverages late at night. A light snack is okay, but a large meal can cause indigestion, which interferes with sleep. Drinking too many fluids at night can cause frequent awakenings to urinate. If possible, avoid medicines that delay or disrupt your sleep. Some commonly prescribed heart, blood pressure, or asthma medications, as well as some over-the-counter and herbal remedies for coughs, colds, or allergies, can disrupt sleep patterns. If you have trouble sleeping, talk to your health care provider or pharmacist to see whether any drugs you’re taking might be contributing to your insomnia and ask whether they can be taken at other times during the day or early in the evening. Don’t take naps after 3 p.m. Naps can help make up for lost sleep, but late afternoon naps can make it harder to fall asleep at night. Relax before bed. Don’t overschedule your day so that no time is left for unwinding. A relaxing activity, such as reading or listening to music, should be part of your bedtime ritual. Take a hot bath before bed. The drop in body temperature after getting out of the bath may help you feel sleepy, and the bath can help you relax and slow down so you’re more ready to sleep. Dark bedroom, cool bedroom, gadget-free bedroom. Get rid of anything in your bedroom that might distract you from sleep, such as noises, bright lights, an uncomfortable bed, or warm temperatures. You sleep better if the temperature in the room is kept on the cool side. A TV, cell phone, or computer in the bedroom can be a distraction and deprive you of needed sleep. Having a comfortable mattress and pillow can help promote a good night’s sleep. Individuals who have insomnia often watch the clock. Turn the clock’s face out of view so you don’t worry about the time while trying to fall asleep. Have the right sunlight exposure. Daylight is key to regulating daily sleep patterns. Try to get outside in natural sunlight for at least thirty minutes each day. If possible, wake up with the sun or use very bright lights in the morning. Sleep experts recommend that, if you have problems falling asleep, you should get an hour of exposure to morning sunlight and turn down the lights before bedtime. Don’t lie in bed awake. If you find yourself still awake after staying in bed for more than twenty minutes or if you are starting to feel anxious or worried, get up and do some relaxing activity until you feel sleepy.

When I swung open the door, there he was: Marlboro Man, wearing Wranglers and a crisp white shirt and boots. And a sweet, heart-melting smile. What are you doing here? I thought. You’re supposed to be in the shower. You’re supposed to be with the sex kitten. “Hey,” he said, wasting no time in stepping through the door and winding his arms around my waist. My arms couldn’t help but drape over his strong shoulders; my lips couldn’t help but find his. He felt soft, warm, safe…and our first kiss turned into a third, and a sixth, and a seventh. It was the same kiss as the night before, when the phone call alerting him to the fire had come. My eyes remained tightly closed as I savored every second, trying to reconcile the present with the horror movie I’d imagined just moments earlier. I had no idea what was going on. At that point, I didn’t even care. “Ummmmm!!! I’m t-t-t-ttellin’!” Mike teased from the top of the stairs, just before running down and embracing Marlboro Man in a bear hug. “Hi, Mike,” Marlboro Man said, politely patting him on the back. “Mike?” I said, smiling and blinking my eyes. “Will you excuse us for a couple of minutes?” Mike obliged, giggling and oooo-ing as he walked toward the kitchen. Marlboro Man picked me up and brought my eyes to the level of his. Smiling, he said, “I’ve been trying to call you this afternoon.” “You have?” I said. I hadn’t even heard the phone ring. “I, um…I sort of took a nine-hour nap.” Marlboro Man chuckled. Oh, that chuckle. I needed it badly that night. He set my feet back down on the floor. “So…,” he teased. “You still cranky?” “Nope,” I finally answered, smiling. So, who is that woman in your house? So…what did you do all day? “Did you ever get any sleep?” So, who is that woman in your house? “Well,” he began. “I had to help Tim with something this morning, then I crashed on the couch for a few hours…it felt pretty good.” Who was the woman? What’s her name? What’s her cup size? He continued. “I would’ve slept all day, but Katie and her family showed up in the middle of my nap,” he said. “I forgot they were staying at my house tonight.” Katie. His cousin Katie. The one with the two young kids, who had probably just gone to bed when I’d called earlier. “Oh…really?” I said, my chest relaxing with a long, quiet exhale. “Yeah…but it’s a little crowded over there,” he said. “I thought I’d come over here and take you to a movie.” I smiled, stroking his back with my hand. “A movie sounds perfect.” The busty, bronze mystery girl slowly faded into oblivion. Mike came barreling out of the kitchen, where he’d been listening to every word. “Hey--if you guys are goin’ to the movie, c-c-c-can you drive me to the mall?” he yelled. “Sure, Mike,” Marlboro Man said. “We’ll drive you to the mall. It’ll cost you ten bucks, though.” And as the three of us made our way outside to Marlboro Man’s diesel pickup, I had to bite my lip to keep myself from articulating the only seven words in the English language that were in my vocabulary at that moment: God help me--I love that man.

before, has it?” Molly shook her head. “No. But I still want him home.” She smiled at the sight of her three children napping on a coverlet spread over the grass. Late afternoon sun angled through the grove of redbud trees, painting shadow pictures across their faces. “Children! Time to wake up. We don’t want to be out after dark.

BUILDING RENEWAL INTO YOUR WORKDAY – Tony Schwartz Zeke is a creative director at a large agency. The workday he described when we first met was typical of the managers and leaders I meet in my travels. After six or six and a half hours of sleep—which never felt like enough—Zeke’s alarm went off at 5:30 a.m. each morning. His first move was to take his iPhone off the night table and check his e-mail. He told himself he did this in case something urgent had come in overnight, but the truth was he just couldn’t resist. Zeke tried to get to the gym at least two times a week, but he traveled frequently, and at home he was often just too tired to work out. Once he got to work—around 7:30 a.m. most days—Zeke grabbed a cup of coffee, sat down at his desk, and checked his e-mail again. By then, twenty-five or more new messages were typically waiting in his in-box. If he didn’t have an early meeting, he might be online for an hour or more without once looking up. Zeke’s days were mostly about meetings. They were usually scheduled one after the other with no time in between. As a result, he would race off to the next meeting without digesting what he’d just taken in at the last one. Lunch was something Zeke squeezed in. He usually brought food back to his desk from the cafeteria and worked while he ate. Around two or three in the afternoon, depending on how much sleep he’d gotten the previous night, Zeke began to feel himself fading. Given his company’s culture, taking even a short nap wasn’t an option. Instead, for a quick hit of energy, he found himself succumbing to a piece of someone’s leftover birthday cake, or running to the vending machine for a Snickers bar. With so many urgent demands, Zeke tended to put off any intensive, challenging work for later. By the end of the day, however, he rarely had the energy to get to it. Even so, he found it difficult to leave work with so much unfinished business. By the time he finally did, usually around 7:30 or 8 p.m., he was pretty much running on empty. After dinner, Zeke tried to get to some of the work he had put off earlier in the day. Much of the time, he simply ended up returning to e-mail or playing games online. Either way, he typically stayed up later than he knew he should. How closely does this match your experience? To the extent that it does resonate, how did this happen? Most important, can you imagine working the way you do now for the next ten or twenty years? YOUR CAPACITY IS LIMITED The challenge is that the demand in our lives increasingly exceeds our capacity.

Today was a day to face that very temptation. A family who had become dear friends had left the church with no warning or explanation. Not even good bye. When they were missing on that first Sunday, we didn’t realize that they had removed themselves from our church. We thought maybe someone was sick or an alarm clock didn’t go off or something simple. If it had been something serious, they would have called us, of course. We had done so much for them and with them. We rejoiced when they rejoiced, we cried when they cried, we prayed with them, we prayed for them, we loved them and felt as if they loved us in return. Of course, one Sunday turned to two, and then three. I mentioned to Michael that I had called and left a message. He told me that he had the same thought as well. He had left a message and sent a card. We felt sad as the realization sank in: they had left the church. People don’t know how to leave a church, and many pastors don’t take such a loss graciously. In all our determinations about pastoring, we had considered the possibility of losing members, but this family was the first. It was time for a lesson for all of us, and I felt the Lord tugging at my spirit. I was to take the first step. Sunday afternoon, Michael taking a nap, kids playing games in their room... Now was as good a time as any. I got into my car and headed toward their house. Suddenly nervous, I sat in the driveway for a minute at first. What was I doing here again? Pastor’s wives don’t do this. I had been around pastor’s wives all my life. Since sensing my call to full time ministry at eighteen, I had been paying close attention to them, and I had never seen one of them do this. I got my words together. I needed an eloquent prayer for such a moment as this one: “Lord, help” (okay, so it wasn’t eloquent). I remembered a verse in Jeremiah: “I, the LORD, search the heart, I test the mind, Even to give every man according to his ways, According to the fruit of his doings” (17:10). The Lord knew my heart, and He understood. In this situation, I knew that I had opened myself up to Him. In this situation, I knew that my heart was pure before Him. All of a sudden, my courage returned. I opened the car door and willed myself toward the front porch. As I walked up the driveway, I also thought about Paul’s warning which I had read earlier that morning: “they failed to reach their goal... because their minds were fixed on what they achieved instead of what they believed” (Romans 9:31-32). This family was not my achievement; they were the Lord’s creation. What I believed was that I had been right in opening my heart to them. What I believed was that Michael and I had been faithful to the Lord and that we had helped this family while they were in our flock. I had not failed to reach my goal thus far, and I felt determined not to fail now. This front porch was not unfamiliar to me. I had been here before on many occasions, with my husband and children. Happy times: dinners, cook-outs, birthdays, engagement announcements, births.... Sad times as well: teenaged child rebelling, financial struggles, hospital stays or even death .... We had been invited to share heartache and joy alike. No, “invited” is the wrong word. We were needed. We were family, and family comes together at such times. This afternoon, however, was different. I was standing on this familiar front porch for a reason that had never brought me here before: I came to say good bye. On this front porch, I knocked on the door. This family had been with us for years, and we had been with them. Remembering how this family had helped and blessed our congregation, I quietly smiled. Remembering how they had enriched our personal lives with their friendship and encouragement, I could feel the tears burning behind my eyes. We would miss them. Remembering all that we had done for them, I wondered how they could leave with no word or even warning. Just stopped coming. Just

If you are fortunate enough to have a preschooler who is still napping in the afternoons, this is the perfect time for schoolwork.

He was forever falling down stairs. I saved his life one day by grabbing his shirt just as he was going out of an upstairs window. One afternoon, I was busy baking and didn’t hear his footsteps when he awoke. The room that he’d shared with his grandmother was his now. When I went upstairs to get him, he’d gotten into a dirty diaper and spread it all over the room. After that, I had him take his nap on a pallet in the corner of the kitchen.

Finally, on Wednesday, they began to lower the sedation again, and immediately he reached for the ventilator tube and tried to pull it out. “Don’t fight it,” I told him again and again, trying to explain what was happening. I held his hand. The nurse came in and told me they were going to try to take the ventilator out. “Do you want me to stay, or leave you?” I asked him. His eyes were closed, but he put his hand out and rubbed my back. Just for a moment. He’s there! I wanted to shout. Everything’s going to be okay. The antibiotics must be working! I wanted to sing and shout and dance. After the ventilator was out, he began opening his eyes just a crack when someone came in to say hello. And things got even better--he was calm although he was still tied down, and when a friend and Willie came in to say hello, Jep said, “What’s up?” I wanted to laugh and cry at the same time. Those were the first words I’d heard him say since he’d gone deer hunting. I questioned him a little, wanting to know what he remembered, but he couldn’t talk much and still seemed very sleepy, dozing off every few minutes. Thursday morning was one of the best days of my life because Jep woke up bright-eyed. “Why am I in here? What happened?” he asked. He didn’t remember anything. He looked awake and alert and rested. But I was exhausted, having gotten very little sleep or food and not knowing if Jep would live or die, while he’d been taking the longest nap of his life. We held hands, and though I was exhausted, I was happy. Thursday afternoon he talked a little more and ate a cracker. He was back. Slowly but surely, he was coming back. He knew who I was, so I believed he would know who the kids were. And he started talking more and more. Thank you, Lord, for bringing Jep back to me.

Gabriel invades Bella Blackcoat as the conquistadors, firewater and smallpox rolled into one. Like her ancestors on either side, she never stood a chance. The sound of his Harley is the pounding of the cavalry hooves of horses that forced her people off the plains. His helmet comes off his head like the hide off a slain buffalo. He pushes through the swinging doors to the bar like he is opening up the Oregon Trail. He strides towards her like a wagon train full of Mormons. His smile is the 1860 Henry repeating rifle, called by its victims the Spirit Gun, capable of mowing down 15 darker-skinned humans in even time. His black leather jacket and his mystery are a second and third clip of 44:02 cartridges. He sits down on a stool, a gold prospector staking a claim, and leans his penile forearm on the bar like it is a revoked treaty. He sings his song and it is Wounded Knee ready to bury Bella’s heart. Gabriel Ahrumet is one-man genocide. Behind the bar, a previously unknown chemical reaction takes place inside Bella as her hormones wake from a long afternoon nap, stretch languorously and start an ancient ceremony around a hurriedly erected campfire. The intensity increases with a ferocity that is disconcerting. A glow begins between her legs, melting the bottom half of her body like licorice on a griddle. Her eggs begin to jiggle and then to sizzle, spattering gooey chunks all over the stove. She slides off her stool. Her legs flow along the sawdust floor, slink up over the bar and wrap themselves around Gabe’s waist. He is too busy admiring the tousle of his hair in the Jim Beam mirror that hangs behind the bar to notice.