Usually I check my e-mail before I go to bed at night, which is between 10:00 and 10:30. I am quite sure that when I awake the next morning there won’t be any new mail waiting for me, because everybody goes to bed when I do, right? Apparently, wrong. Each morning I am astounded anew to discover email from real people in my inbox. How were they awake to write me? As I was drifting off last night, I reminded myself that some people are actually awake passed 10:30 and into the middle of the night, and they are online during that time. That thought lead me to wonder, “What did people in the 70’s do when they were up in the middle of the night?”
I associate the 70’s with simplicity and innocence; I was a child in the 70’s. Sometimes I wonder if children today will have the same thought about 2010 that I have about 1975. The world appears simpler and more innocent when you are a child, no matter what time period you are in.
In my mind’s eye I went on a brief but delightful journey through the night of an insomniac in the 70’s.
My rendition of a night of an insomniac in the 70’s: watch Serpico while noshing on Jiffy Pop and a glass of Martini and Rossi Asti Spumante; nightly reading of I’m OK, You’re OK to help with the insomniac's growing awareness of the new concept of self-esteem; scrapbooking; peruse the Encyclopedia Britannica to gain knowledge about anything the insomniac could ever want to know, providing them with an intellectual advantage at dinner parties over the people that sleep through the night; write letters to friends and family around the world. This activity would require paper, pen, envelopes, and stamps, which most households in the 70’s had in their possession; nightly reading to the Fern and Philodendron from I’m Okay, You’re Okay to enhance the growth of their leaves and their ever so fragile sense of self; heartfelt sing along with Helen Reddy to I am Woman. Then it’s 4:00 am, time to crawl under the floral sheets and dream of the simplicity of the 40’s.
If only life were so simple for the modern day insomniac.
I love this so much. I will need to ask my mom, but I think you've pretty much nailed it (I was there, but I was not really an adult yet). Except there was no cable, and TV stations shut off after a certain hour, so if it was between, say, 1 a.m and 4 a.m., you were screwed.
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