Adrenaline Rush

Last night at 11:47 pm, I was sleeping soundly - very soundly. The wind was gusting fiercely, but this didn't disturb my deep slumber. I had gone to bed quite late the night before, and I was making a serious effort to catch up on my Z's.

But it was at that very minute that Mac bolted up and let out a loud, barbaric vocalization.

I awoke in a panic. In the split second that followed, my first three thoughts were:
-someone is attacking us
-there is an animal in our bed
-Mac is having a seizure or some other medical problem.

My heart was pounding. But in this split second, Mac had flopped back down and was motionless and silent.

I paused a second, but Mac didn't move.

I shook hime gently. "Mac, are you ok?"

"hmmm? yeah," he muttered sleepily, without an ounce of concern in his voice. I, on the otherhand, had some concern.

"Mac, you just sat up and screamed."

"I stood up," Mac clarified. "I think I was dreaming."

"Mac, you've never done that before!"

"Yeah." he was completely non-plussed and almost instantly asleep.

I rolled over and tried to go back to sleep, but I was so alert I couldn't even close my eyes. My legs were twitching, my heart was racing; obviously my adrenal glands had gotten me prepared for a "fight or flight" situation. But my easily duped endocrine organs had apparently never considered that Mac might just be dreaming.

I tossed and turned. I considered getting up, but instead I watched the clock for the next two hours. I last remember looking at it at 2:15.

---

When my alarm went off this morning it didn't seem possible that the night had already passed. I hauled myself out of bed and into the bathroom. Mac was in there a few minutes later, earlier than I have seen him up in a month, and he was looking quite chipper.

"How'd you sleep?" I probed.

"Oh, pretty good. How about you?"

"Hmmmm..." I gave him a strange look.

"Not so good, huh? How come? the wind?"

I just kept staring with a strange look.

"What?!" He was clearly confused.

"You don't remember waking up?" I asked

"No."

"We even talked," I informed him.

"What did we talk about?" Clearly, no bells were ringing.

I decided to clue him in. "You got up and screamed."

"Oh. Was that just last night?" Umm, hello?,YES!

Mac now got interested: what did he do? what did he sound like? what did we talk about? I filled him in.

Then Mac says,"yeah, that was a weird dream," but he has no other details. But he does have a little bit more light to shed on the subject:

"My dad does that. I think he yells in his sleep almost every night."

Fantastic. I can't wait to go to sleep tonight.