Sunday Thought: Our Lady of Sleep?

I caught the end of some TV show about sleep disorders. I had meant to watch the whole thing but, as often happens, got distracted by something else (probably another show), and remembered only when the hour was almost up that I was supposed to be watching that other thing. So I flipped back real quick and saw a young boy tucking himself into bed while the narrator said that he (the boy) would lose 10-15 years off his life every time he went to sleep. That can't be right. I must have heard wrong, or else the narrator's guilty of bad grammar, or sleep deprivation. I have heard that a condition called sleep apnea can take 10-15 years off your life all told. That's if it doesn't kill you first for not breathing. Anyway, the two second snippet I saw put me in mind of the Blessed Virgin, but it wasn't my fault. I rummaged around in the old cerebral suitcase for a while before it finally came to me. I did some more rummaging through one of our bookcases and finally found it too (the book, I mean). Then I had to rummage around in the book to find the passage. (All the rummaging took over an hour.) It was in a letter from Flannery O'Connor to one of her friends. Apparently the friend (who at the time was religiously curious, later converted to Catholicism under O'Connor's influence, before finally de-converting, to O'Connor's grief) had mentioned in her own letter something about broken sleep, to which Flannery responded:

The business of the broken sleep is interesting, but the business of sleep generally is interesting. I once did without it almost all the time for several weeks. I had high fever and was taking cortisone in big doses, which prevents your sleeping. I was starving to go to sleep. Since then I have come to think of sleep as metaphorically connected with the mother of God. Hopkins said she was the air we breathe, but I have come to realize her most in the gift of going to sleep. Life without her would be equivalent to me to life without sleep, and as she contained Christ for a time, she seems to contain our life in sleep for a time so that we are able to wake up in peace.

The reason it rung the bell for me is that when I have trouble sleeping, I head for the rosary. Well, more accurately, I start saying Hail Mary's. Holding the beads doesn't help. I'm usually too tired to keep track of which bead I'm on in which decade, so I just jump in with "Hail Mary, etc." and keep going. (I've more than once realized that I've said several Hail Mary's while still holding on to the same bead, so I have to start over.) I do try to think of a few intentions beforehand so that I'll feel like I'm doing something more important than counting Mary's in lieu of sheep. I'll just have to trust that the Lady doesn't mind. After all, she gave the idea for the rosary to some saint way back when, it's repetitious by nature, so she can't complain if people use it as a sleep-aid. It was her idea. Plus, the only reason it ever occurred to me to use it that way is that she once rocked baby Jesus to sleep, so I figure she can do the same for me. Rocking is repetitious, but so are the good habits that end in virtue. (So they tell me, not having gotten that far.)

The only other technique that works nearly as well is stuffing the King James Bible under my pillow. I don't know why it works, but it does. Just trust me.

I won't have that problem tonight, though. I did a lot of yardwork and inhaled enough beer to keep me yawning through this post. Probably best not to tempt fate. The night might come when I can't sleep and she won't let the Hail Mary's work. Fine. I have a backup plan. It's called the Miraculous Medal. No beads to count. Just hang on and say the words. Over and over.