late afternoon nap

You lie there on your back and close your eyes once more. It's late afternoon and it drizzles outside, and you're trying to escape a headache.

You open your eyes again, with a sigh, as though someone were there to hear it, and without lifting your head you peer down at your hands, with fingers interlaced, lying across the slow swell of your chest. Your eyes move up now and find the blurred blades of the ceiling fan spinning above you, rippling the veil of mosquito net that hangs around you, and sending down swirls of air all about you.

You close your eyes again and hope this time it'll happen. And you think of your day and feel like it's the fifth straight day where all you've done is read. Just read... until your eyes and head hurt. And the image won't get out of your head. And it makes no sense, but it's still there. And it won't get out of your head... your dad, holed up in that dark workroom, with his book, and his scotch, and how he'd withdraw like that for days at a time. And it's a stupid thought so you open your eyes.

You see again that the fan spins above you. And the veil ripples around you. And the breeze swirls about you. So you close your eyes again and try to be soothed by those things...

But it's no use. You open your eyes, and you're thinking, and you don't want to be thinking...

But... but... time is precious, you think, and you're wasting it. And you feel lonely and a little sad. And you're upset that you feel lonely, and then you're upset about being upset over such a thing for it's natural to feel lonely sometimes. And sad sometimes. And that thought doesn't lessen the sad feeling under your interlaced fingers, but it brings you to peace with it.

And then you realize your eyes are still open. And there's still the spinning above, the ripples around, and the swirls all about.

And again you close your eyes, and this time they stay closed, and sleep comes to you easily.