The Art and Science of the MegaNap

Remember how Forrest Gump said the best part of being shot in the butt-tocks was the ice cream? Well I gotta’ tell you, the best part of being on the Sauce is the sleep.

I. Can. Nap.

And I don’t just mean a little old close-my-eyelids and grab a quick, refreshing snooze kind of nap. No, I mean a show-stopping, day-altering, two-ton galactic explosion of a nap. The kind of nap that you wake up from not knowing what year it is. It’s like Morgan Freeman is in my head narrating a slideshow of images from the Hubble telescope of deep space. I’m talking about the kind of nap that starts with the sun up and ends with the sun down and the only thing left to do is eat dinner and, amazingly, go back to sleep.

And my naps aren’t limited to the afternoon, either. Oh no. I can wake up in the morning, take all my pills and down some cinnamon toast crunch, and head right back to bed for a nap that takes me right on into a late lunch like a runner rounding third heading for home. And for those of you considering cancer just for the naps, here’s a little pro tip: make use of the white noise app that your kids like. Crank up the “extreme rain pouring” and you’re off to an aquarian paradise for as long as you like, even when the buffalo herd returns home from school and stampedes around the house downstairs.

And I think these naps are truly the grace of God, because I’ve never wanted to escape consciousness more often than I do now. It’s not that I’m depressed or sad, although I’ve struggled more with those and anxiety than I expected with this. Honestly, it’s that a lot of times I just don’t want to be aware of my crappy day anymore. Let me be clear: I know that I’m a really lucky guy and I am not complaining. I have an amazing family and community and don’t have to worry about things that occupy a lot of people’s time in this world, like poverty or abusive family members or drugs or any number of things. But there are certain elements of my life at the moment that are, uh… less than desireable. Mostly it’s centered around my vanity and the fact that this present predicament, what with the double chin my low thyroid function is gifting me, the attractively smooth bald head, the ever-present dark bags under my eyes, and the potbelly caused by the sheer size of the tumor in my abdomen, makes me look like something you’d swerve around as it’s making a reckless slow-motion bid for the freedom offered by the other side of the road. That’s right, I’m becoming a turtle. An Early Thirties Mutant No-Longer-Even-Kind-Of-Athletic Turtle. So yeah, life is short and sweet and I know I should “carpe diem” and all, but sometimes a guy just needs a break.

And that, my friend, is why God gave us MegaNaps. Thanks be to God.