And you know you will not be able to fall asleep until you begin to understand him. And you can’t fall asleep because you’re always thinking about so many things, in a distinct order, and all at once. Thinking about very small things like laundry detergent, or the sandwich you had for lunch today, or debating whether you offended someone at that party with your off-color remarks about Asians...while you also ponder big cares like your bank account, recent developments in your love life, your anxiety about the Christian Right, and what it would be like if you existed as someone else, even for a minute, and could see yourself as they do.
Many nights you wish you could keep that sensation of being…else…that your body always prevents with a sharp tingling in the back of your teeth that acts as the emergency switch to make you stop—before your very identity is lost.
And, of course, riding along with all of these concerns, is your fear of death. Every day you think about death before you sleep. Which does make sense. After all, it’s a natural progression of thought as you approach the middle space between waking and…whatever. But sometimes you can’t get over it, and will just stay up thinking for hours and hours. You remember this happening to you ever since you were young. You couldn’t name it then, but there was a recognized fear that often drove you out of bed to your mother. Until your nearsighted eyes could adjust to the sudden light in the living room, you would just grope along toward the formless figure you hoped to be your mother on the couch. And even though you knew she would scold you for staying up, at least you could escape, for a few moments, the dark isolation.
Do you remember the words your mother used to sing when you were afraid to fall asleep? That silly song about the Duke of York who had ten thousand men or something like that? No that was a long time ago, you’ve forgotten the words, but you certainly remember the beat. You can still clap your hands to it, da duh da duh da duh. And, great wit that you are, you even came up with a new song—which, on further reflection, you suppose is probably related to him:
‘Cause when you’re up you’re up,
and when you’re down, you’re down,
and when your mind takes you for a ride,
you’re always up and down.
But you like to remind yourself that you’re “just fine.” Such thoughts, you’ve reasoned, are not symptoms of a clinical depression, but rather evidence of your mind’s great talent at compartmentalization. What a blessing, some minds are never organized. And with such a talent you would logically conclude that your thoughts would settle down into sleep, but apparently you still don’t understand him.
In the house next door, another restless figure turns in his bed. He can’t sleep either but, then again, he doesn’t really have to, his dreams are always superimposed on reality.
How can he be sane when even the pigeons make him nervous?
How can he be lucid when everything tastes like electricity and fog?
And every night that you leave your bed and go over to your window and stare across the way, you can just barely make out his outline by the streetlight’s yellow sphere reflecting in the glass. He is always there staring back. And you wonder each time what it would be like to know yourself through his mind. Does he see you at all? Do his eyes supply a coherent picture of the world, or does the outside stimuli dissolve into shifting blobs of flickering neon before he can process them? You trace encouraging words on the window with your fingers—backwards so he can read them—if he can even read them. And then you begin to wonder why it’s so important to you that you help him. And the lack of rest is starting to frenzy your thoughts. And though it’s becoming harder to think logically, you begin to see the implications of the strange connection you have formed. Maybe you should stop this before it starts. Maybe you should just think about the sandwich you had for lunch. Draw back from the chasm outside the window, and simply.fall.asleep.already. Even though you know you cannot fall sleep if you don’t understand him. But maybe you will come to understand. Actually, it’s okay if you don’t understand, really it is. Your patience can only take so much. We all have to sleep at some point. It’s okay if you don’t understand It’s okay if you don’t. Its okay if you don’t.
It’s okay,
it’s okay,
it’s okay if you can’t escape yourself.
SM Oct 2010
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