Resisting Sleep
I offer this for no other reason than maybe you feel seen too. Maybe you know this feeling.
When we’re little and we’re tired, we resist it because we don’t want to miss anything. Cool stuff is happening downstairs and we want to be a part of it — the laughter, the clinking of glasses, the perfume and cigarette smoke and grownups in the living room.
But when we’re big and we’re tired, we resist it because who knows why? We could fall into that dense yogurt sleep of a three-year-old, but we don’t.
What do we do instead? We fiddle with the knobs on the dishwasher, suddenly engrossed with how dirty the inside perimeter of its door is, mindlessly digging the sponge into the layer of scum — as though right now this is the most important thing in the world to do. It’s not. Go to sleep.
We pay little heed to our yawning and our eyelids’ passive hostility. They slide down over our eyeballs, closing only slightly and only napping there for a second before sliding up again. Hands get sloppy, they seem limp in this otherwise simple task.
The back says, “Please. Please. Something else. Something where I can be horizontal, flat. Anything.” We think maybe to lie down. But glancing at the clock, it just doesn’t seem right. And after some time, we…
