Well, it happened again last night.  I didn’t really remember until Al asked me this morning “what was so funny?”   Then I remembered: I actually woke myself up because was giggling and laughing in my sleep.  I couldn’t tell you what was going on in the dream but I can tell you that it is (apparently) a common occurrence for me.  The first time I knew about it was spending a night in a hotel room with my childhood girlfriend, Pat, when we met up in Florida after 40 years.  She informed me the next morning that I was laughing in my sleep.  Since then it has become clear I do laugh in my sleep.  A lot.

I don’t always wake myself up laughing but sometimes I do and it is the most delightful experience.  When my dream laughter wakes me up I end up really giggling up a storm, half asleep, at the absurdity of it.  That is the part I can remember in them morning and which just starts my day off blissfully.  My subconscious is happy!  Yay!

I also don’t always laugh.  Sometimes I will forget I’m married and wake up, crying out in fear and flailing at air because there’s a bad guy invading my space, but that is rarer than my default sleep emotion of tra-la-la-la-la.

As a person who deals with depression and doesn’t suffer stress well, it is nice to know I find joy and laughter in the depths of my subconscious.  Last week I was so stressed out at having (once again) overextended myself in several directions that I had to reluctantly and sadly resign from the chorus which I had hemmed and hawed about rejoining in the first place.   I guess I hawed when I should have hemmed or vice versa and the time commitment put me right over the edge.  The proof of my correct decision did not ultimately come from the instant sense of relief after I resigned or the lightness with which I have carried myself since last week, but last night when I woke myself up laughing in my sleep!

The next time insomnia hits with a vengeance I’ll have to remember this and maybe my brain will decide to be in a hurry to get to Mary’s Subcon Comedy Club.