While dolphins are the true multi-taskers, one half of their brain sleeps while the other half keeps the rest of them from drowning or becoming propeller dice, humans are completely immobile, vulnerable predator bait for around 8 hours a day which forced us to form strong bonds with other humans to share the watch and to make strong homes with security systems to protect us.
But what do humans have that's kind of neat? Paradoxical sleep. It allows us to dream and allows our brains to go through all the same electrical messaging they would do if our dreams were real except for actually causing our bodies to move--most of the time.
When it doesn't, NFL footballs stars have crushed their dressers, sleep walkers have traveled through the house unconsciously and at times even ventured out into the night with sometimes scary and dangerous results, and I sit up in bed and yelp as a basketball is unexpectedly thrown at me by an imagined friend. I catch it and awake with nothing but air from the middle of the net in my hands. If only I had had the same reflexes as a teen when sports weren't everything, they were the only thing.
© Loren M. Lambert, November 28, 2015
But what do humans have that's kind of neat? Paradoxical sleep. It allows us to dream and allows our brains to go through all the same electrical messaging they would do if our dreams were real except for actually causing our bodies to move--most of the time.
When it doesn't, NFL footballs stars have crushed their dressers, sleep walkers have traveled through the house unconsciously and at times even ventured out into the night with sometimes scary and dangerous results, and I sit up in bed and yelp as a basketball is unexpectedly thrown at me by an imagined friend. I catch it and awake with nothing but air from the middle of the net in my hands. If only I had had the same reflexes as a teen when sports weren't everything, they were the only thing.
© Loren M. Lambert, November 28, 2015
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