"what do you want from me?" i asked the darkness.
it was more of a statement and less of a question. questions often demand answers. you can't demand anything from something that won't reply. in the same way, you can't ask a question to nothing. i wasn't expecting much anyway, answer or not. i just wanted to sleep. to finally achieve the rest i'd be waiting for all weekend. this was the fourth night that sleep eluded me. it's not like i wasn't tired. i was, really. i believe it was just the multitude of things on my mind, combined with the growing unpleasant feeling still lurking in my stomach. was this feeling some leftover remnant of the flu i had acquired friday, or was this a more nervous unsettling notion based off of more of my uncertainties? admittedly, it could go either way. but my guess was that i still had some sort of bug working it's way out of my system.
but my mind. my mind, i still could not turn off.
for what reason? what purpose?
i kept waiting for someone to be calling my name, so that like samuel i could say, "speak Lord, for your servant is listening," and perhaps i could go back to sleep.
i did find it amusing that sleep spent by death cab was the song playing on my itunes as i started to write. i certainly had no sleep to spend. perhaps my quota was up. as if i was allotted a specific number of hours i was allowed to devote to sleep and my useless younger years sucked them dry without me being any the wiser.
"i have to work tomorrow." i said. once again speaking a sentence into the stillness somehow hoping the back corner of my mind i might gain results.
i'm not sure what me having to work had to do with me attempting to get sleep. but maybe if i bartered with the air filling my four walls, i could strike a deal well enough to land a few hours of sleep. i didn't ask for ten hours, or twelve; just as many as i could manage to sneak in before my all too early alarm rang. early in the sense of how much i wanted it to be late, not necessarily denoting a time of day. by practical standards i was expected to wake up late in morning. but like everything i find in my life, early and morning are two relative terms. for that matter, things being relative are relative. i declare breakfast to be the first meal of the day regardless of actual time, and i know people who disagree. the notion of time is a man made invention along with time zones and things of the like. time is obviously occurring, but it's markings are not dependent on anything real.
twelve twenty one in the morning here only means that it's somewhere in the range of four in the afternoon in australia. obviously it's all dependent on sunlight and our constant necessity for it, but other than that, it's all pretend.

my mind was starting to wind down. twenty good minutes of solid writing in combination with all of the slow depressing songs brought to my ears by ben gibbard certainly had a way of soothing my scattered thoughts into a more streamlined progression of ideas all heading towards the same goal of punching out for the night. i hoped my brain knew that it wasn't getting paid overtime for any of this awake nonsense.

i had readied myself to turn off my computer, and silence my keyboard although the whirring of the motors and the small sincere clicks were ever so comforting, but it was then that the final thought steadily took it's time card and i heard the loud ka-chunk of the machine. and this thought was "there is already too much pressure to perform to the standards that have already been created for a situation that could have by itself proved to be most satisfactory and ideal."

what was i supposed to do with that? i let the thought wait in the lobby before i let it leave. it had a point. i feel that way but in a much magnified sense. this is what happens with you toy with the future. when you twist, and you bend, and you manipulate. instead of waiting and watching. the future is meant to be experienced not explored.

"i will let things be the way the should be. for better, for worse, i will stop trying to mold what lies ahead to my standards and my hopes and my wants. i will let things progress naturally as best as i can. for what You have planned for me will always transcend any attempt i make."
for once the darkness seemed to lighten to a soft grey. it seemed pleased with my response to it's former hush.

finally.
finally it granted me the peace to allow my mind to rest, my eyes to close, and my body to slumber.
and with that, i shut my whirring metal box, and allowed it to sleep with me in silence.