After a wonderful night out at my drama societys christmas party I was relieved to collapse into bed, tired and shivering (its a long walk back to halls in a thin cardigan in winter) but very happy and fell right to sleep. Two hours later I was starting to feel my sore feet, and sleep was evading me. There's a quote from The Time Traveler's Wife which sums up my sleep technique perfectly:
Sometimes sleep abandons me and I pretend. I breathe slowly and deeply.
I make my eyes still under eyelids, I makemy mind still, and soon, Sleep,
seeing a perfect reproduction of himself, comes to be united with his facsimile.
But this time it was to no avail.
So I caved. I knew it was the last thing I should do, I knew the bright lights would wake me up, I knew the activity would stimulate my brain and once I had started, I knew I wouldn't be getting back into bed for hours. Turning on my laptop was the first mistake, the fairy lights were the second, opening up facebook in my browser tipped me over the edge.
And so my night continued... until I glanced down at the clock and realised that in 2 and a half hours I was going to have to get up and take the train into the city, brave the rush hour underground traffic, locate my sister on a busy platform and take her to her first university interview.
In the interest of helping her become more independent, our parents decided she could travel and attend her interview on her own which resulted in an immediate phonecall to me. I miss my siste when I'm at uni, not seeing her everyday, not hearing all the insignificant details about her day is really strange and taking time to adjust to. Its different with my friends from home; Lots of our communication was, and still is, over facebook, text and skype so although I now don't go out every friday night with them and tuesday pub quizzes are a thing of the past, I still feel connected. But with my sister, she was always there, she understood my mood and my expressions, she could finish my sentences for me and not having her around is sad. Thus I jumped at the opportunity to take her to her interview, despite the fact that I'm going home for semester break at the end of the week.
What I failed to take into account was that this was the last week before christmas. I have something planned for every night this week and none of them are likely to end before 2am. So last night I watched movies with mulled wine, I went to our meal, cracked crackers, wore, and subsequently lost, my santa hat and then went out to my favourite club where they have live piano and kit and the atmosphere is just wonderful and danced my heart out without any regard for how I'd feel the next day.
And now, in less than 2 hours, I will be getting up, making my self look presentable and dragging my feet to the station to begin what will be an exhausting day. I just hope that I remember to get off at the right stop. And that I don't crash halfway through the day. I think lots of coffee is in order.
