Tropical Nights

I was at a loss for a topic today, so I consulted my "Writers Book of Days." The writing suggestion for January 8th? "It's What I Do in the Middle of the Night." Here is what I came up with:

I open my eyes at 3:00a.m., wondering why I'm awake. Then it starts, subtle at first. I can actually sense the heat begin from within my chest, then travel to my head and limbs. I physically feel the sweat forming under my skin, then flow out my pores. Within minutes, I'm drenched. I throw my down comforter off me, fan my pajama top, and wait for it all to subside. After a few minutes, it does, and I'm suddenly cold. So I crawl back under the covers, smooth my wet hair, and try to catch a few winks, before the whole episode plays itself out again a mere thirty minutes later. Then again. And again.

This is what I do in the middle of the night. Sweat. I hate it.

Interruption of sleep aside, I feel gypped somehow. I thought when I left Florida, my "days of perspiration" were far behind me. I thought that once I moved back up North, during the snowy winter months, things would be different. I could finally don flannel pajamas each night, drink hot tea by the fireplace, then sleepily retire to my cozy warm bed, covered with a fluffy white down comforter, the kind that Julie Andrews had displayed on her bed in The Sound of Music. Now, instead, my body nightly sends me to the equator in July, five or six times over.

My doctor tells me it's my hormones, part of growing older, and has placed me on medication that makes the nightly ordeal a little less fierce, but still existent. I know there are far worse maladies with which to be stricken, and there are many who are much, much worse off than I. I'm sure, if they were reading this, they'd tell me to suck it up and quit whining. They're absolutely right. But, truth is, I'd give just about everything I own for just one, peaceful night on my Julie Andrews bed...