I wrote this the other night after I had taken an Ambien and not promptly made it to my bed. I’m not going to pretend that it’s good, but it’s interesting. I really don’t write stuff like this when I’m not rapidly losing my mind to a pharmaceutical sleep aid.
I wrote this and posted it, woke up in the morning in a cold sweat because I knew I had posted something, and pulled it down.
But tonight– Ambien again, and bed is still some combination of time and distance away… so, without further ado: musings on Ambien, on Ambien.
Ambien has a tendency to make me mean. Also it makes me bullshit and stupid. This is known.
Ambien brings back repressed memories — tonight, I am remembering the first 10 or so years of my life, when I was fully convinced that I was an alien, that I was an elf. I hadn’t a flicker of this memory for 15 years, but now am remembering it with such clarity that I don’t only remember the details, but, if I cross my eyes just right, I remember how it felt. It was overpowering, ever present, the way I feel now about sex, or sex. Obviously, I was doomed from the start. This was known, lost, now known again.
Ambien makes me an avid planner. I plan events, trips, meetings, conversations, teams. Teams are the focus tonight– a beach volley ball team for the rec league at Shawnee Mission Beach Volleyball, a Crawl for Cancer team, maybe Toastmasters? Forensics? Dancing? Are those teams? This is not known.
Sleep will sort this all out, it is the great equalizer.
Mornings have a different effect. They do make me mean. They make me bullshit and stupid, true. But, mornings lock-up my dreams from the night before– short lived memories where I am an alien or an elf. I won’t have a flicker of those memories ever again, just like not sex, or not sex.
In mornings I abandon all that was planned the night before, for a drive to work, two cups, a conference call, and maybe a PowerPoint.
Ambien giveth, mornings taketh away.
