Windchimes

where do stories hide?

I should be sleeping, and I did take a long, deep nap this evening, but now the events of the day replay. We had a debate in German class today. Of course, when you have a debate in a foreign language class, the "resolveds" have to be pretty overarching to give students, mostly still struggling to produce the language, plenty of possibilities to discuss. So, in this one, one side argued that there should be "world-passports," and other factors whose end result for all practical purposes would be, I suppose, a one-nation world. The other side argued against that. Much speculation and generalization. Fine. It was an assignment, so you go with it. You imagine that you believe certain things, then imagine how you would argue for those things. Anyway, all the things that were said keep revolving in my mind, along with what I would have like to have said, like an insomnia merry-go-round.

But just in describing what's keeping me awake, I feel ready to let it all go.

Everything else is going well lately, and, like I told some friends yesterday, I've been laboring under the happy delusion that I've got everything under control this week. Except that I've started smoking again. Shame too, I had almost 50 smoke-free days. On the other hand (the lighter hand?) now I know that I can do it. Next time, I'll do it longer. I've also been assessing what went wrong, and how I can handle things better the next time, and where and how I can find more resolve. My excuses, raisons justificatives, are tests and papers, especially of the stay-up-all-night writing variety. Maybe kicking the procrastination habit would help, too.

But I've got to start sleeping a little more. Four hours last night, and that's been, pretty much, the average during the week. Sounds like a college student, but then, most college students have a little more youth on their side.

We have a coffee-guru (I'm stealing a phrase from a friend named Jesse) in our office. He has a coffee grinder there at work, and brings beans, caffeinated and not, to grind and put in the office suite coffee can. There's also a small coffee stand in the building. Since moving into my own little corner, I've been drinking coffee from the common office pot, a blend of caffeinated and non-caffeinated, and saving quite a bit of money. 'Bout time I contributed to the coffee-bean buying pot again. But this morning, I went to the coffee stand and bought a small coffee with a shot of espresso. Still never felt all the way awake. I said something to our coffee-guru, and he said, "You just need to get some sleep." He said it very emphatically, thank goodness. Made me determined to do just that.

So I'm going to try again. After one more cigarette.

J.H. Larrew
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