It’s funny as a kid how you’ll pick up on your parents’ ways of doing things — even when those ways don’t make any sense.
A prime example came to light about two years ago, on a weekend when my partner Ryan and I were craving bagels. “Want to go to Einstein Bros. tomorrow?” I asked. In the Midwest, that’s the fancy place to get bagels, because your only other option is usually grocery store.
We agreed to drive to the closest Einstein Bros. that Sunday and pick up a baker’s dozen. “I’ll go get the bagels when the store opens at 6am so they don’t sell out of the flavors we want,” I said.
Ryan looked at me like I was crazy. “Sell out? They’re open until 2pm. I don’t think we need to go that early.”
In that moment, I didn’t know what to say. You had to go to Einstein Bros. as soon as they opened, otherwise they’d sell out. That’s ALWAYS how my dad used to do it.
When I was a kid, bagel days were typically a surprise. There was generally no rhyme or reason as to why my dad picked up bagels in the wee hours of the morning when the rest of us were still sleeping. I’d simply come downstairs in the morning, and voilà, there was a baker’s dozen on the counter for my family to dig into.
To me, that became the correct way to get bagels — right as the bakery first opened, and before anyone else was awake.
But as Ryan and I talked about it, I started to realize my dad’s way of doing things was kind of weird. For starters, Einstein Bros. is a freaking chain restaurant. They don’t make a super tiny amount of artisanal bagels from scratch every day. Expecting them to run out of bagels is like expecting Olive Garden to run out of breadsticks.
If Einstein was open until 2pm, it’s likely they would have the flavors we wanted if we rolled up to the drive-thru at a reasonable hour, like 10am. Sure enough, when Ryan and I went mid-morning to get our baker’s dozen, there were plenty of bagels left. We got all of our favorite flavors — cranberry, blueberry, French toast, and chocolate chip.
It was then that I started to question why my dad went to Einstein so dang early. I don’t think it was due to a shortage of bagel choices. Instead, I think it was likely due to insomnia.
Now, I should be clear that (as far as I know) my dad never had any kind of official insomnia diagnosis or did anything to treat it. But it’s such a common condition, and because interrupted sleep seemed to be a constant throughout his adult life, I believe he struggled with insomnia. Some of that sleeplessness may have been due to personal choices, but I do think he had trouble falling and staying asleep on a regular basis.
My dad was worse than your typical night owl. As a kid, I remember laying in bed and hearing him clomp up and down the stairs between the guest bedroom (where he mostly slept) and his office all night long. I never knew exactly what he was doing, but I do know he was a chronic procrastinator who typically saved work projects until the last minute. I also know that he seemed to work better at night.
I don’t think my dad ever had a healthy relationship with sleep for as long as he raised me. I have no memories of him following anything remotely close to a bedtime routine, and it was normal to spot him napping in the middle of the day (especially when he was working from home).
One of my most vivid, recurring childhood memories is waking up at 3 or 4am to the sound of the TV blaring in the guest room, where dad was sleeping. Some nights, it seemed like I was the only one who heard it. I’d groggily stumble down the hall and find him completely conked, oblivious to the noise. I’d fumble with the hidden buttons on the side of the TV until I got it to shut off, and then go back to bed myself.
I’ve come to believe that spontaneous bagel days were often the result of dad’s insomnia, too. I can imagine that he stayed up until the sun rose quite often. Our local Einstein was only about five minutes down the street, so driving there was no big deal if he was already awake at 6am.
That was the catch, I realized years later when I Ryan and I got bagels together. Dad was already awake. Getting bagels in the early morning was rarely premeditated. It just happened when it happened.
After that realization, I started to think about how much insomnia probably impacted the way my dad went about his day-to-day life.
I know from personal experience that insomnia is a bitch. I didn’t have too much trouble sleeping when I was a kid, but once I was in my 20s, staying asleep the entire night became tough. Waking up between 1 and 4am for no reason is normal for me now. And some nights, I never go back to sleep.
When I worked a traditional 9-5, it felt nearly impossible to get through the days that I didn’t sleep — especially when it happened several nights in a row.
Frequent sleeplessness often causes my anxiety to reach a fever pitch where I’ll have several panic attacks a day. Sometimes I’ll get the other side of the coin, where I’ll feel so depressed and angry that it’s hard to get out of bed or interact with other people. I can’t focus at work, and my motivation becomes nonexistent.
Even as I’m describing this, I feel like I’m not fully capturing how terrible I feel when my insomnia gets the best of me. I just can’t function. And sometimes I wonder if my dad felt the same way.
Now that I work for myself as a freelancer, I definitely do some of the same things he did back when I was a kid. I nap a lot during the day to make up for lost sleep, and do find myself working on stuff in the evening. However, I have a strict rule that I don’t do anything on my computer if I find myself up at an ungodly hour, since working at 3am rarely encourages me to fall back to sleep.
I’ve still never gotten bagels at 6am, but one day it might happen. I feel like that would really bring things full circle.
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