Sleeping can be an art form. I try not to let it be such a dominant force in my life. Still, its power is unique. Like a wise man once said, close those two little slits in your face and within seconds your entire body will cooperate in harmonious unity. What a design! I wonder if it's patented.

I am usually the second one up in our house. The first person up is my baby, Tadin. He likes to stand on my stomach in the morning. He looks down at me, strings of drool extending between his chin and my chest. His smile is dazzling as he waves his bottle saying, "BooKAH! BooKAH!", which means, "Get up lazy mommy, I want milk." I stagger to the kitchen and oblige. I glance in the mirror as I stand up and notice that I look like Howard Stern. How does Joan Lunden do it every morning?

After fetching the newspaper from the sidewalk and putting on a pot of coffee, I go back to the bedroom to help my true love arise. His head is usually superglued to the pillow. To detach it is somewhat like surgically separating Siamese twins.

Our morning situation is unique. My husband usually suffers from either severe headaches when he wakes up or another ailment he calls watermelon head. This is where the brain feels as if about twenty pounds of wet sand has been pumped into each ear. The body can be set in an upright position, something like the passenger seat in an airplane. But unless the special locking device has been pushed to the "on" position, the body snaps back against the bed like a mousetrap.

Most mornings I'm flailing at mental cobwebs. Once I surface from the nethergloom, I realize that I have a mission to go back and save my mate. Then two voices begin to do battle within me, sounding something like Darth Vader and Porky Pig.

"Give in Kim, give in to the dark side of the force," beckons the deep lugubrious James Earl Jones voice. (Maybe its more like the Amazing Kreskin: You're getting sleepy...very sleepy...)

"B-b-b-ut-but-buttee-butt-ee. We gotta get up now! C-c-c-come on now, we g-g-g-gotta get up!" chirps the cheery little piggy voice.

"Noooo, Kim, give in, give in to the dark side," says the grim, burbling low voice.

"G-g-g-gosh you Darth Vader, you meany, you just c-c-c-c-cut that out, I gotta get up! Sh-sh-shucks!"

And the piglet wins! What an agony to resist the temptation to lie down again and snuggle my rump into my yummy bed. Oh, life's little pleasures. My wonderful, chiropractically correct waffle pillow, and my flannel sheet. Please God, let me pretend the word responsibility doesn't exist.

But by then, the kids are switching on cartoons. I hear the rustle of the cereal box and the "Oh NO!" of spilled milk. Grinning bravely, I determine to stay on the good side of the force.