I think my apartment complex decided to repair the siding on my building.
I engaged in the last crazy chapters of George Orwell’s 1984 this morning after writing my last post. I had completely forgotten how absolutely dark that book is. Like, read until it is 6:30 AM, forgotten.
My version had an interesting essay, comparing 1984 with Aldous Huxley’s Brave New World and Yevgeny Zamyatin’s We (which I had never heard of or read before). I agreed with the essay’s author that Brave New World is a bit closer to what could happen to Western civilization than 1984 and presumably, We. I also thought about China while reading 1984 and the essay mentions this connection too. I think all books greatly exaggerate what could happen, but maybe they strike a few too many chords for comfort. Note to self: Reading about metaphysics at six in the morning does help and prevent sleep. It makes the mind race and get extremely tired from racing at the same time. Geez! Not a bedtime story!
Sadly, I woke up four hours later to a strange banging noise around my apartment. After I realized what was probably going on, I decided to go ahead and get out of bed. I haven’t heard the noises since. Figures!
My neighbor always takes a shower at 4:30 AM during the work week. I wonder what he or she does for living because no one should be up at this hour besides me. Wait, no, I should be in bed.
I remember fondly the last night I slept soundly. It was Sunday night and although I had a super disturbing dream to wake me up, I woke up refreshed.
I haven’t slept well since.
First, I thought it was because my sleep cycle hasn’t been regular, so I’ve been trying to go to bed earlier and earlier each day. I thought it was nerves or the caffeine I had at 10pm one night. But I’m starting to think it’s neither because I’ve slept poorly for three nights, despite the fact I have new fancy sheets and a comforter. (Thanks mom!)
And so I sit here typing, realizing there is this tiny noise. This tiny consistent noise that tends to boil my blood, no matter where I am. This noise I could blame for all my terrible nights of sleep (or being wide awake). So maybe I could find the origin of this noise and kick its tiny face shut.
A tiny dog.
I imagine it to be a little poodle. Maybe because I like poodles the least of them all. I imagine someone received it as a Christmas present because I remember this side of the apartment complex being relatively quiet, with the exception of the poolside parties and my crazy neighbors Joe and Eric. I imagine someone has left the poodle on their porch for the day as they went to work because it. will. not. stop. barking.
I think if this continues, I’ll be that “that girl” that complains to the owner or the apartment complex. We’ll see if they actually paid a pet deposit for this little barking alarm clock in the first place. Is that mean? Maybe I actually can be mean if I don’t sleep for three nights straight. Hmm.
I couldn’t sleep last night. In fact, I have trouble sleeping a lot of nights. Today I started to realize that maybe it isn’t 100% bad — that maybe I was meant to be up, alone in the quiet. When’s the last time you stood still? …somewhere quiet, the place that people fear. What’s so scary about the silence? It’s because when the silence sinks in, it’s just you and your thoughts. And that’s a scary place.
In the midst of confronting my inner thoughts, I found myself in complete awe. An image popped into my head and all I could do was tell God how big He is and how thankful I am that He’s so big.
Domino Rally. That was the image. Read more »
