Can I Please Hibernate?

It's that time of year. Squirrels are stuffing their cheeks full of nuts to bring back to their nests. Bear are busy growing fat layers to keep them warm. And people - stupid people - decide to continue being productive, some even more so now that the vacation season is over. Instead of giving in to our natural instinct to hibernate, we ignore it. I'm telling you, if ever a company decides to give their employees time off for hibernation, I will be the first to take the job.

It's happening to me. I'm getting more tired as the sunlight goes away. I want to stay asleep in my nice warm bed, tucked inside my cozy cave of a bedroom. I want to wake up periodically only to eat and then go back to my nice warm nest. And I want to eat. I want to eat all the time. I'm tellin' ya - it's the hibernation instinct that has sabotaged any weight loss effort.

My hearty thanks to the brilliant woman out there who originally wrote this beautiful piece of prose. If I ever find out who you are, I will think of something really cool to do to thank you, but I can't think of anything right now because I'm too tired. I'm sure many of you have read this, but it resonates with everything I'm feeling right now:

In this life, I’m a woman. In my next life, I’d like to come back as a bear. When you’re a bear, you get to hibernate. You do nothing but sleep for six months. I could deal with that. Before you hibernate, you’re supposed to eat yourself stupid. I could deal with that too. When you’re a girl bear, you birth your children (who are the size of walnuts) while you’re sleeping and wake to partially grown, cute, cuddly cubs. I could definitely deal with that. If you’re mama bear, everyone knows you mean business. You swat anyone who bothers your cubs. If your cubs get out of line, you swat them too. I could deal with that. If you’re a bear, your mate EXPECTS you to wake up growling. He EXPECTS that you will have hairy legs and excess body fat. Yup, gonna be a bear!