Saturday, September 19, 2015

Trans-Atlantic Insomnia

I can't sleep.

I didn't sleep much last night,
and for the last week I've been running at full throttle,
planning and preparing for this trip to Venice,
and now here I am on the plane:
with the seat fully reclined, lights out, had a glass of red wine,
and I've got relaxing music in my headphones.

Still, I can't sleep.

All the boxes are checked, all my ducks are in a row,
but there's one factor that always seems to cancel everything else out:

I am stoked out of my mind!

I'm going to Venice. 
For months I've been planning and preparing for this,
and now, at thirty-five thousand feet of altitude, 
I'm traveling over six hundred miles an hour towards my destination.

Physically I'm exhausted,
and in this reclined seat, I am quite comfortable.
The logical side of my brain understands all the reasons why I should close my eyes and just check out.

Ah, but then there's that other part of my brain,
the one that's jumping up and down outside the window, in goggles and a snoopy hat out on the wing of the plane, screaming:
"WOO HOO!!! I'M GOING TO VENICE!!!
HEY LOOK, I THINK I CAN SEE IT RIGHT NOW!!!"
Yeah, that guy is keeping me wide awake.

This is not my first bout of trans-Atlantic insomnia.
It happens like this just about every time we make this trip.
Invariably I arrive completely wasted, staggering off the plane, and wondering if maybe I could just crawl into a corner and die - all the while cursing that side of my brain that wouldn't shut the heck up somewhere over Greenland.

Maybe, just maybe I'll manage to drift off sometime soon.
If not, I'm thinking that if I could just bang my head hard enough against a bulkhead, I might succeed in knocking myself out.

I can't sleep.
Don't know why I can't just fall asleeee........

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