Not Up In The Night

I used to be an athlete of sleeplessness. I could perform great feats of derring-do with zero rest. In high school, my average bedtime was midnight or one - nothing particularly special about that. But in college, I regularly pulled literal all-nighters. I remember more than once typing all night and then watching the sun rise while waiting for class to start. It used to not bother me. I could go without sleep for an entire night and then just sleep a regular six or seven hours for the next couple nights until a weekend came along and then I'd catch up. It just wasn't a big deal.

No longer.

Unfortunately, I've lost my athlete status. I once was the Michael Jordan of going without sleep and now I'm the post-retirement Charles Barkley - fat, slow, and no longer capable of my former feats. I'm a big wuss now when it comes to sleep. It's not like I'm my mom and I feel like turning in at 6:30 in the evening but it's also not like I can just go without rest without being severely affected.

The last all-nighter I pulled was at Wayne State during my first year. I went to the 24 hour computer lab at 9 or 10 and stayed until about 5 a.m. I went straight to work from there and was a complete washout for the rest of the day. I couldn't teach, couldn't function, could barely stand.

I don't even attempt anything like that these days but it's more than that. These days I can barely stay up for a movie. I'm still plugging away, still adding movies to my qualifying exam list for school. I don't usually try to watch them until after the girls are in bed because when they're up and about there are too many distractions. But even once they're in bed, Suzanne and I usually watch some TV together and talk for at least an hour or two so I don't get to any movie until 10 p.m. 10 shouldn't be late but it is, especially if I'm watching something that isn't exactly holding my attention fully.

Case in point: Over the weekend, I watched Orson Welles's The Lady from Shanghai. I watched the first forty five minutes during the day with the girls (which is funny because they totally understand the basics of what's going on: "Daddy, is that blond lady trying to tempt that man?") but then I still had another forty five minutes to go. So we go through our usual ritual, get the girls to bed, watch TV for an hour, and then I decide I'm going to finish the movie once Suzanne goes to sleep.

I start the movie, turn on the "display" function that tells me how many minutes are left and start watching. The next thing I know, Suzanne elbows me and says, "You're snoring." I look up and not even ten minutes have gone by. I fell asleep in less then five minutes and was snoring, sitting up, with the light on.

Obviously, I was setting myself up by trying to watch the movie in bed but it happened last week on the couch while trying to watch Border Incident. I just don't have the stamina I once did. I'm thirty five and I'm no longer a young man. Sigh.

So obviously a couple of things need to happen. Movies need to take a little priority over the Food Network so I can watch them earlier in the evening. (Thing about the Food Network is, whatever it is that you missed, they'll play it again in another day or two, probably twice.). Also, I need to watch the movies in the family room and not in bed. I might as well take an Ambien or drink six beers if I'm going to watch musicals in bed.

My days as an athlete of sleeplessness are over but perhaps my best days of cleverly outwitting my age and physical limitations are yet to come.