There’s very few things I take pride in regarding myself. One of those few things is that I’m a great sleeper. My older brother, my mom, and my late grandma all were/are terrible sleepers. Waking in the middle of the night, wandering the halls and out to the living room to attempt to lull themselves back to sleep watching TV. My older brother ends up downstairs on his couch nearly every night at 3 am so he doesn’t wake my sister-in-law. I don’t know about you, but that just sounds awful.
Me? Ask my wife, I’m snoring five minutes after I lie down. Sleeping has never been a problem for me. My dad is the same way. He had a painfully bum hip for the past couple years, yet he still slept like a log. He had hip replacement surgery last August and now he’s doing great. I think my mom sleeps better than she used to, but not as good as dad.
Point is, if sleeping were a superpower I’d be Superman.
So on those rare occasions where I don’t sleep worth a crap they stand out. Last night was one of those times. Or, I should say this morning as I’m writing this at 3:30 am. I tried and tried to get some more shut eye, but by the time 3:15 rolled around I knew I wasn’t going to be falling asleep. Or if I did it’d be 5 minutes before the alarm went off and I’d be even worse off. So I hit the shower, brewed some coffee, and started tap-tap-tapping on the keyboard.
So why didn’t I sleep well? Usually it’s a couple things; either I was staring at my phone too long and got the engine in my skull running and it wouldn’t shut off, or something is bothering me. The phone thing usually only happens when my wife isn’t home at bedtime. I start doom scrolling and end up in some internet wormhole. The wife has on occasion the last couple months stayed at our daughter’s apartment if she was going to help out with our kiddo’s dog. It’s just easier to be there in the morning instead of getting up extra early to drive 25 minutes. Her work schedule is flexible and she can work from home as long as she’s got her laptop.
Back in the day if I had a couple beers during the week that could make me not sleep, too. You’d think it would be the opposite, but no I end up sleeping horribly if that IPA doesn’t hit right. I did have a couple beers while cooking dinner last night, and they were beers I’d never had before. Maybe that was a factor, but I felt fine(and tired) when I went to sleep.
So that leaves something is bothering me. Something’s stuck in my craw and it’s festering somewhere just under the surface where I can’t quite see what it is. Our oldest is in the process of looking for an apartment with their friend in Indianapolis, which is 2 1/2 to 3 hours away. That might be part of it. It’s not that I don’t think they’ll be fine on their own. Hell, they moved out of the house at 16 to go to the Indiana Academy for their junior and senior years of high school. They figured out how to live on their own pretty quickly. They can shop for themselves and are responsible when it comes to paying bills on time. They bought a 2016 Nissan Rogue in the fall with very little miles and is in great shape. So having a reliable car isn’t the issue. Plus, they paid cash so there’s no car payment.
I guess I’m just going to miss having them around. At 23(24 in May) they’re the other adult that I can talk to. We like a lot of the same movies and shows, so we talk a lot about stuff we want to see or saw a long time ago. There’s not a lot of overlap when it comes to music we listen to, but we’ll still talk about music. They like boygenius and I like boygenius as well(they even bought me a Lucy Dacus LP a couple years ago.) We even went to the Kurt Vonnegut Museum for my birthday, just the two of us and we had a great time.
I’m happy for my oldest. I know they’re ready to get the hell out of small town, Indiana and be somewhere a little more inclusive. God knows this place isn’t all that inclusive. I mean, it’s fine as long as you don’t tell anybody that you’re not religious and that you’re gay and non-binary. If you completely hide who your true self is and go along with the same right-heavy politics and say things like “We need God back in school”, then you’re golden. And no, not everyone is a Republican or super religious, but dammit you have to really look hard to find those of us who think a little more progressively when you’re in small town Hoosierville.
I’m not a fan of rising and shining at 3 am, but there’s something about these small hours that brings a kind of existential quiet over everything. With a cup of coffee I feel like my brain opens and I can exorcise ideas and thoughts better than in daylight hours. And when I hit work in an hour and a half I’ll be all bright-eyed and bushy tailed ready to take on whatever fresh Hell my corporate Overlord has to offer. That is until about 11 am. That’s when I’ll crash like Black Friday.
Daughter inevitably moving away, the open-ended situation with my job, the last few months with my other daughter and the ex-boyfriend stealing the dog saga, as well as some other butt-puckering situations I’m just not thinking of(or blocked out for mental health purposes.) I guess I could see how those could be hiding behind some unkempt bush in my mind like the boogeyman, just waiting to jump out and keep me awake all night with anxiety, worry, and unknowns.
Oh, and that IPA. No more IPAs during the week. I’m 50 for Christ’s sake. I watch Grey’s Anatomy with my wife, and dress my senior dog in colored sweaters and call him by 5 other names. I’m not some “party animal”.
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