I used to find my sleeplessness – I usually fall off for a few hours, wake for maybe two, then sleep until morning – a cause of distress, and I have ground down more than a few teeth in gnashing protest. None of the manifold putative remedies – sheep, Bovril, breathing or visualisation exercises – have ever helped. I used to find this infuriating, and would stew in the dark next to my wife (who falls asleep in two minutes) exhorting myself: “Sleep! Sleep!”This injunction, of course, makes things worse. Eventually it works, mostly because it is exhausting to chant inwardly for hours on end, desperate to drop off. But what a telling mismetaphor that is! Drop off what? The edge of a cliff? It’s hardly a wonder one resists doing it, it’s dangerous.
Often I would get up and write, which is a near-perfect remedy for sleep. But I have recently come to accept what I thought of as a malady, and to embrace it as a boon. The reason for this is my Kindle. Until I had one, I would turn on the lamp by the side of my bed, which could awaken even the soundly sleeping Belinda, who would inquire how long I intended to keep it on, and her awake? But my Kindle has a cutesy little light that protrudes from the leather cover like some bit of a praying mantis, and which now allows me to read without causing distress to my loved one. And this, I find, is absolutely dandy. Looked at coolly, I have not only extended my day by a couple of hours, but created a time in which the only thing I can do is read.