The 1am Buzz

Lids spring open.  The roar of an F-16, running touch and go drills on barren tarmac.  Abruptly ended sleep. Just in time for dinner, if I was in Eastern Daylight Time (EDT).  6 days in a row and counting.  The hands on the clock have moved 360 ticks past midnight.  As if on a timer, ocular shades fly open, triggered by the 360th tick.

My mind begins to race and then, as though awaiting the right moment, the buzz approaches and fades, approaches and fades, approaches and fades for the next three hours.  Avoiding any anti-aircraft defense I can muster.   I work to create a improvised mosquito net out of my bed sheet.  The sheet is barely big enough for a over-sized three year old.  There are two, beyond stuffed and hockey-goalie-pad firm pillows that I have chosen to use as my first line of defense against the mosquito.

Finally after wearying frustration I become desensitized enough that the mosquito's flyby began to seem more distant and fleeting.   Both the mosquito and I finally reach a level of exhaustion where I drift back into the darkness only to be rudely awaken by my alarm clock and the shimmer of morning light through my gaudy, patterned window curtains.  Lethargic, I roll out of bed hoping that my interrupted nap will be more true the next night and that the mosquito will find another victim or that I will find a full enough sleep to be oblivious to the repetitive, minute, intravenous blood extraction.