There is nothing I value more than the peace and quiet and well-deserved “alone time.” There is nothing I loathe more than “quiet time” when my brain is on overdrive, trying to figure out a solution to a problem I have not yet defined.
There are nights when you are completely exhausted. Your body is tired, your mind is tired, your bed never felt more comfortable. The pillows are perfectly aligned, you’re yawning every couple of minutes. Yet you watch the fan blade’s infinite spin chasing the blade in front of it, like a dog chasing its own tail.
Sleep does not come. I’m watching the clock on the cable TV box tick off minutes… surely I got into bed around 10:00, how is it 11:45 and I am still awake? What is bothering me?
I check off the to-do list for the umpteenth thousandth time: laundry – check, meetings in the morning – check, bills paid – check. The mind is still racing in neutral with absolutely no forward momentum. It’s 2:45 in the morning. I’ve gotten up at least four times and went downstairs to change my location as I have been told to do when you get your sleeplessness. I try to read War and Peace, then a book on astro-physics… trying for dryer and dryer content to tire out or distract whatever tidbit of information is keeping me awake.
4:45… 4:46…
I wake up to my iPhone screaming, “AWOOOO GAH, AWOOOO GAH!” It’s 6:00 a.m. Christ, it’s gonna be a hell of a Monday.
