A Little Night Musing

Insomnia is a mixed blessing a mixed blessing for me. This is an upgrade from scourge. I'm hoping for, and working towards, insomnia being a pleasant little bit of productivity.

Traditionally, insomnia has been anxiety induced. It generally does not take much to get me worked about something but sleep is generally sacred and easy for me. Get me thinking about student loans and their deferments and I'm up for an hour easy trying to mentally calculate a way that I will not be poor forever.

This all was magnified when I quit my job and moved halfway across the country. My nighttime anxiety repertoire had expanded to include lack of income, fear of rejection on job applications, fear of failure, and how long could my savings holdout. There was a whole month that I didn't get to sleep until two hours later than usual.

There is, however, some truth to the old adage, that one get used to anything given enough time. Eventually, the drama became melodramatic and tired was tired. Sleep ceased to elude me. This too lasted a month.

However, in the art of a true worrier, in a class almost professional, I found something new to worry about, relationships. I don't think to much about relationships on a regular basis. I'm kinda like a guy in that sense. But when there is worrying to be done, you pull up your boot straps and find something to worry about. I don't just have work ethic, I've got worry ethic too.

The nice thing about my recent bouts of insomnia is that I've learned to move from the object of worry. Now I do a lot of thinking, mostly angry feminist, liberal, and/or political ranting. Grrr, Bush. Grrr, felonous athletes. Grrr, $2.10/gallon gas. Of course, not all of it is angry. There was the night I laid in bed thinking of "the list" for 45 minutes before finally just getting up and writing it. There are the things I can picture myself doing to improve the workplaces where I have applied for jobs. Hmmm, there's also the ideas I have for foods I'd like to try to make without a recipe and how'd I'd approach them.

So maybe insomnia is a good thing in the end. I may feel useless 7 to 7, but then my brain gets kicking and I feel like doing something because I'm passionate about it. Maybe getting to bed after midnight is a good thing.