Perhaps this is an indication.

It was night, not all that late.  10:18pm to be exact.  I was waking up to the strange sensation of ear buds in my ears.  Ear buds that were attached to my cell phone, which showed the time.  And then it all started coming together.

The fact that I was lying on top of my bed, still dressed.  The lights on in the kitchen.  And of course, the phone by my side.

I had been in a conversation with a friend.  We had been talking on the phone.  I remembered being interested in the topic, though at one point, feeling the slightest bit drowsy from a long day.  I had no memory of fighting to stay awake as we talked.  No effort to stave off sleep.

But apparently, like a switch, I just turned off and sleep took over.  Because there I was at 10:18 with a phone still attached to my head and a hazy but certain knowledge that I had never said ‘goodbye’.  The conversation with my friend was not given its proper, formal ending.  I’d just drifted into dreamland, somewhere, mid-sentence.

How strange for him to be talking and eventually discover I was asleep.  I wonder how long it took before he realized?  Did he try to wake me?

Maybe he thought my phone battery died.  That would be less embarrassing.  But who knows, maybe I was doing the deep-sleep breathing right in his ear.  Even worse, was I snoring?

Is this my indication?  That I’m burning the candle at both ends?  That my social skills are worse than rusty, they’re simply atrocious?  Or is this faux pas a mere reflection of the fact that even moms get tired from the first day of school.

I don’t know what it means, but at least it was a friend I was talking to.  I’m hoping we can laugh about it later.