Awakening to Sunlight

I can’t remember the last time I walked from my bedroom to my kitchen for a first cup of coffee without turning on a few lights. For the past two weeks I’ve been driving out to the AeroKnow Museum, sometimes at 4:40, sometimes 6:40, all in darkness. Frequently recently, I’ve had dinner after arriving home by 7:30 or so, fallen asleep in my living room chair with dishes and utensils on a side table, awakened about 2:30 or 3 to a silent TV that shut down automatically. Then I’ve turned on the living room radio tuned to 970 AM and listened to Red Eye talk radio and the best conversations since Larry King was on radio and nowhere else. Often I’ve listened in the darkness until the LED clock indicated it was time to change my shorts and drive out to the airport before going to work at 8:45. Things were different last night.
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For one thing, I slept in my bed for the second night in a row, a real first for me since October. Earlier in the day, while at “employer,”  I arranged with a repairman to work on upstairs resident’s heater. It was going to cost a chunk of dough — and I don’t mean Pillsbury, boy. It meant less Christmas for moi, but it also meant something more important than that: it meant the esteemed upstairs resident and her kids would be happy. I alerted “employer” that I would be late arriving Wednesday because I had to be home for the repairman. No problem. My grand plan yesterday was to arrive at the museum at 5 a, to leave to be back at the house at 9:15 in case the repairman arrived a little early, and then go from home to “employer.”
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At about 3 a, I awakened in bed with some persistent, unpleasant “heartburn” that is probably acid reflux in the throat, something I never experience when semi-supine in the living room chair. I discovered that drinking a glass and a half of iced tea did not help at all.  I resisted returning to the kitchen for a TUMS or two or three. I don’t want to risk getting into the habit of taking these things because it’s more important for my GI tract (gastro-intestinal equipment) to take care of itself. So I lay in bed, changing postures to spread the acid reflux action around the affected area while listening to Red Eye radio on AM 970 WMAY.  During these gyrations, I decided to save myself the tedium of getting myself out to the airport at 5. I was going to try to squeeze in some more sleep before arising about 9 to meet the repair guy. After  two hours of this, I realized the “heartburn” was over, and when the radio turned itself off the third time, I didn’t punch the bedside clock radio button to resume the low-volume banter of the Jim Bohannon Show that follows the Red Eye. Soon after I was asleep.
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When I next opened my eyes at 7:40 I could see something I had not seen in God’s own light for a few months: my bedroom. And instead of imitating a barnacle until 9:00, I arose and cleaned up the house a damn site more thoroughly than I had since summer.
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I washed more than two or three dishes for the first time in more than a month. I cleared the clutter from my living room end tables. I put several videos back into boxes and returned them to the shelves behind the TV. And I did a lot more.  Didn’t vacuum because good people might still be sleeping upstairs.
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Something else happened. I had surrendered to the notion that I was not going to have my furnace  repaired until the new year because I HAD to spend as much time at “employer” as possible, regardless of where the mental Tom Thumb, who writes the checks would get around to paying me.  Repair man was very nice; came to my basement, spent three minutes close to my furnace and explained I needed a new igniter. WHEW! I knew they weren’t way expensive; a friend (at the time) two years ago had replaced one.  The man went after one, came back and installed it, and my pilot light lit for the first time since last March.  First thing I did after he departed, to finish the task with upstairs resident’s heat , was to turn off my heat and set the thermostat to rock bottom temperature where it will stay until I return home from a poetry event this evening in beautiful downtown Springfield. I will leave the thermostat as it is, most likely until Christmas day. I will not be cold on the blessed birthday.
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My routine is not changing because of a working furnace. I’ll be at AeroKnow Museum by 5:05 Thursday through Saturday. I will do some shopping Saturday, mostly for clothes, and I’ll bring home a new guitar, I had pretty much paid for before yesterday.  There will be no bottle of Wild Turkey on my table on the 25th, but there will be a warm home and I will have dark socks again; maybe a new dress shirt or two. On balance, I think the trouble upstairs was a blessing. 
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Live long . . . . . and proper.