Thursday, January 17

do these things come with an off switch?

Often times I'll look at Jeremy and ask, "what are you thinking?" His reply is usually an astoundingly casual "nothing". It amazes me every time because I can't remember a time when I thought "nothing"--my brain is always moving. I'm not saying that in a taunting 5 year-old "nay-neh, nay-neh, nay-neh, I'm smarter than you are" way. Because I'm not, he's my better half and that includes the brains. We're just different personalities, I'm too much of an analyzer, and he's more relaxed. I wish I were more like him though, because then I could fall asleep in a matter of seconds rather than the agonizingly long time it usually takes me.

No matter how exhausted I am, it always always ALWAYS takes me a long time to fall asleep because my brain just won't shut up and shut down. The really annoying thing about it is that I come up with some of my worst ideas ever at night, which always sound really great until light of day hits. Example. When I was in 6th grade I had a crush on a boy who I knew, but not very well. I decided that the next time I passed him at recess and he was with his friends and I was with mine, I would wink at him. A little token from me to him, that no one else would notice, but would get him thinking about me. Yeah, a wink would be perfect. I was so excited about my plan, I stayed up for hours thinking about it and lost some much needed sanity-restoring sleep.

Then morning came and reality struck. It was a horrible plan, for many many reasons.
One. I'm a terrible winker. I can't do it without moving my mouth and half closing my other eye. He probably would have thought I was having a seizure rather than winking.
Two. What eleven year old boy at RECESS is going to notice some dumb girl winking at him? A seizure maybe, but probably not a wink.
Three. What if he did notice and decided to act on my very alluring wink?! I wasn't allowed to date. And...
Four. I was still scared of boys despite what my crazy night mind tried to believe otherwise.

Fortunately my alter ego of the morning saved me from that disastrous situation, and many others like it. So seriously. Before I concoct another assortment of ways to embarrass myself, can I please get some sleep? Who's got the NyQuil?

3 comments:

The Shill Spill said...

Sooo sorry to hear about the lack of sleep coming your way. But, I must say...that was a truly great entry! I wish my brain worked like yours some days. :) Just to have such neat things to think about. But, alas, I am not nearly the woman you are. (I'll just have to deal with that.) :)

Anonymous said...

I wonder if that thing where you can't shut your brain off at night is genetic or enviormental cuz i have the exact same problem. its even worse when you are tired, you have something important in the morning, and you still can't sleep.

one other thing--responding "nothing" to the question "what are you thinking about" is man-talk for "i probably shouldn't tell you cuz you wouldn't approve or you might get angry."

Anonymous said...

don't define the "nothing" answer to her!!! now she'll want even more answers!