Friday, June 15, 2007

sunny bedtime

Some of my most vivid memories from my childhood have to do with bedtime. In particular, going to bed during the summer.
I can remember lying in bed looking up at the shadows from cars speed across and around the tops of my walls like it was a race track. I can remember feeling hot. I can remember not feeling tired and most off all, I can remember the feel of that sunny room; a bright place, when it was supposed to be dark.
I always felt like my parents were tricking me during these summer night bedtimes. How could it be time to end my day, when the sights and sounds of what I knew my day to be were still present?
Well, recently, I have found a poem by Robert Louis Stevenson from "A Child's Garden of Verses" that perfectly portrays my thoughts about the summer bedtimes from long ago.
Bed In Summer
In winter I get up at night
And dress by yellow candle-light.
In summer, quite the other way,
I have to go to bed by day.

I have to go to bed and see
The birds still hopping on the tree,
Or hear the grown-up people's feet
Still going past me in the street.

And does it not seem hard to you,
When all the sky is clear and blue,
And I should like so much to play,
To have to go to bed by day?


I read this poem with my children the other night. They sat silently after I finished. Perhaps they have not felt the feelings about the injustice and confusion of going to bed while it's still light outside (they are tucked snugly in at 7:30pm each night!). Maybe they have been quite content about going to bed while the noises of the day are still echoing in the neighborhood. Maybe I have just given them something to think about. I wonder if it will come back to bite me?

1 comment:

Nesting Momma said...

well this will bless my little Tabitha. She tells me all the time..it's early, the sun is up. I got the chills reading this. So beautiful. She has a hard time falling asleep. Mabey this will help. We read a lot each night. This can be our new nini poem. Thanks!