There was a cry in her voice when she got on the phone and it brought back memories. There are times when one just can not get to sleep, usually when the need is greatest. When I was a kid it was the one-two punch of stress and fear.

It came to a head when I was ten and we were living in yet another house infested with bad spirits in the night. I had to find a solution. When there are night monsters, you lose options. For example, your leg can not leave the physical plane occupied by the mattress. Hang it over the edge, and who knows what might happen.

Something had to give. The first thing I tried that worked and that didn’t involve other people actually did involve other people. I reasoned that the house we were in had to be built using day labor. I also reasoned that like a movie film that can be seen over and over, those times were not gone but just archived somehow. So I imagined myself  at the house in those days. It was sunny and the foundation was poured and the subfloor was being installed. The men were taking lunch and chit chatting. I felt safe.

Eventually I was not afraid of the night and couldn’t sleep for other reasons. That was when I came up with the successful  strategy where I would imagine myself in a canoe with a bunch of indigenous dudes, one of whom was an elderly chief. We were cutting across a placid lake whose water was deep green and very still. I liked the calm, and again I felt safe. The shores were quite a ways off, all forest right down to a short beach. I would look at the vee wake caused by the propulsion forward from the silently placed oars. I could smell that morning on the lake smell that doesn’t ever change.

So when I took the call, it was like she was a kindred spirit because I’d been there many times. I still don’t get much sleep the night before I go on the road. It’s like nature is out to get us.

She’d done similar strategies, it turns out. In her case, she’d put herself in some peril (as a character in a story made up on the spot) and figure her way out of it. The way this works is counter to common sense but is handy when common sense fails to deliver. Common sense says you clear your mind and fall into a slumber. The opposite is to give up on trying and instead put yourself into a situation mentally that takes your thoughts away from the frustrations of failed attempts to sleep. It works though. Stimulating one’s mind seems to wrestle control back away from whatever stresses interfere with sleeping.

We jabbered over twenty minutes before we finally had to cut it off and go our ways, but I admitted  that for my part I was glad she could not get to sleep tonight because it was a treat that we talked. Meanie that I am.

I hate that she would suffer this, but it’s what happens! When we next meet, I’ll see how it went after the call ended. Insomnia is no fun.