Insomnia, my old paramour, has come for an extended stay. He’s a bit of a jerk as he tends to keep me up until daybreak. I have told him over and over again that I need my beauty sleep, to which he responds, “No amount of sleep will help you with that, honey.”
Not me.
What is really unfortunate about not sleeping is that the world does not care. The day continues whether you are bright-eyed and bushy-tailed or bleary-eyed and scraggly-tailed. I’m writing this now at 2am in the morning, laughing maniacally as I calculate for the millionth time how much sleep – or rather, how little – I will get. My mind is bouncing around like a newborn joey but my body is tired… because it just gave birth to a joey. Those interspecies births are killer.
These are the thoughts I tend to ruminate on when Insomnia tries to make our relationship work again by showering me with wakefulness:
MORTALITY
THE MEANING OF LIFE
LOVE
HEART-BREAK
FAMILY
CATS
WHAT TOMORROW’S BREAKFAST WILL CONSIST OF
Except for cats and food, my thoughts tend toward the melancholy when I find myself in Insomnia’s uncomfortable, restless embrace strangle-hold. It’s not enough that I can’t sleep, I must also grapple with unanswerable ontological questions that are deeply unsettling and thus, not conducive to sleep.
Luckily, I have coping mechanisms! One is to read and do homework because being productive is generally a GoodLifeChoice ™. Another way I cope is meticulously painting my nails with the likenesses of the first ten U.S. presidents. I also generally get up at some point and eat my feelings in the form of a gallon tub of hummus and some hippie flax seed crackers. If I really can’t sleep, I will cry. Usually while rolling around and sobbing, “I DID MY BEST…I DID MY BEST.” It sounds very theatrical. And it is.
“This would be ever so restful if I weren’t deathly allergic to pollen and grass.”
There is nothing quite like the hysteria of a mental breakdown from Insomnia. But maybe when I finally fall asleep and wake up in the morning, I will find the emotional strength to break up with him. He was never good enough for me anyway and always brutally murdered those sheep I am so fond of counting. That jerk.
- Daughter
