When your imagination wears you out

I heard the back door click the way it does when I’m trying to leave it ajar so when I carry the next load of groceries in, I can push it open without turning the knob. When I see a light on in the office, too, I bolt upright.

It’s 3:30 a.m.

Someone is in the house.

Mr. T’s asleep beside me. Goliath is snoring on the floor. (Yeah right. He’s in his double cushioned bed, the prince.) I’m laying rigid, a sheen of sweat breaking out as my heart knocks in my chest.

Go back to sleep. No one’s in the house. T would wake up! It’s just the wind. T left the light on in the office. You’re crazy. Go back to sleep. 

I start that irrational cycle of trying-to-calm-down-but-making-it-worse bargaining that I usually reserve for when T’s out of town and I think there are serial killers in the backyard. Just hold still. If you don’t move, you’ll be safe. Stay under the blanket even though you’re sweating. It will protect you. They’ll leave after they get what they came for. (Which is what, precisely? The stack of ungraded papers on my desk? Our ginormous pile of recycling and receipts? Our aged PCs?)

You’d think I would be relieved when the light went out some time later, but no, I’m pretty sure I heard the burglar padding around in the dark.

By the time I got myself back to sleep, the alarm was sounding and with a very grumpy countenance, I greeted Monday.

All this is to say, my energy today is mellow, small, fragile, slow growing like Scotch moss.

For today’s  BlogHer NaBloPoMo challenge to depict “Energy,” I tried my damndest to find a snail… like the ones I see EVERY single day (and, erm, relocate). Couldn’t find a single slimy one, of course.

xoxo,
shawna

NaBloPoMo May 2015
May 1– To selfie or not to selfie
May 2- Helping things grow
May 3- All the feels