Sleep Schedule

N E W N O T E

“Sleep Schedule”

12:05am

It is past midnight and I am awake. It’s becoming an awfully painful habit of mine, one that I wish would stop.

Like clockwork my body springs awake at the hour, my hands itching to move just for the hell of it.

It is not necessary.

The cogs in my brain need rewriting, midnight is not a good time to decide to worry about your life choices or accidentally remembering that thing you did when you were fourteen which was so deeply embarrassing you just try to ignore that it ever happened but the memory resurfaces to the top of my mind every time and -

Stop.

Think about something else.

Think about tomorrow, the prospect of a day off that surely enough will turn into a busy day because I cannot give myself a rest. Take a break - something I just can’t justify. The days are short and so I expand them, cut into my evening and find more day to work with. That way the day never truly ends, and perhaps if I never fall asleep it will feel like I’ve got an untapped source of time, creating more time.

Time...what is the time?

12:15am

Shit, I should be sleeping. Yet, while I am wide awake, my partner sleeps soundlessly by my side.

When talking about sleep, some use the phrase “he’s out cold”, but not my partner. He is warm - perhaps too warm - but I don’t mind because his sleeping presence reminds me what I should be doing.

REM.

I should probably remember what it is like to dream at night instead of daydreaming of sleep.

It’s okay though, because my partner and I spoon and fit perfectly together - two puzzle pieces destined to find one another in a sea of corner pieces. I don’t mind being awake for this. Feeling his steady breath and the occasional body jitter, I wonder what it is that he’s dreaming of.

If I move he’ll mumble “I love you” and go back to sleep but tonight I’m drawn to the sounds outside my window.

From my bed the sound of a main road, a river and a forest can be heard. The valley I reside in is quiet for the most part, but nature takes hold on dark nights like this when it thinks no one is listening.

A small distance away, the hoot of a barn owl repeats like a lullaby. It’s soft, but loud enough to draw my attention.

I can picture the barn it rests in. Classic red like the ones in the movies, along a quiet stretch of road and picture perfect fields that deers take a liking to. I’ve played in the haystacks in this barn since I was a kid and the image comes to me quickly, even in my sleep deprived state. As I hear the bird, it’s call carried by the whistling winds, I wonder if the owl is calling out for a friend.

Alone in the night, with only the darkness for company, perhaps an owl can get lonely. The sky is vast with stars and I ponder on how small the owl must feel when the wind rushes through its wings and it soars higher than before. Alas, the bird will never reach the stars or find what it is looking for in the darkness.

It will never have a friend because the night belongs to those who sleep, and those who sleep are never awake to hear the call of a lonely barn owl.

But I am awake.

And at 12:30am, I wonder if the bird knows it is not the only night owl to exist tonight.