This morning, I woke up and thought “if I just drilled a nail into my skull, I could sleep a little longer.”
Before I do any of the soul-searching required when one wakes up thinking something like this, let’s just look at the logic behind it. First, you don’t drill a nail (well, you can, but it’s gross and not the kind of nail I’m talking about. Watch at your own risk). It makes no sense. A screw, yes. A nail, no. Nails require hammers. And for some reason, banging a nail into my temple seems a tad more painful than the way I imagined it just sliding in at 3 o’clock. Second, SLEEP A LITTLE LONGER? Chances are, if I slid/hammered/drilled a nail anywhere near my temple, I’d be doing a little more than sleeping.
So now that we’ve covered the sheer insanity of my thought, let’s really get down to it. I. Am. Tired. That basically sums it all up. Two years ago, I started working at DC’s best local radio station while I was working on my master’s degree at Georgetown. A year later, I picked up a second job at MLB Network Radio at Sirius XM. I distinctly remember one of my coworkers telling me that I needed to slow down, or I was going to burn out. But being the energy-laden 20-something I was, I knew I’d be just fine. And last week, I stopped in to chat with one of my bosses, who asked me how everything was going. After I finished recounting a schedule that I can’t even keep up with, he laughed and shook his head.
“Still burning the wick at both ends.”
“Nothing I can’t handle,” I’d assured him. Looks like I was wrong. Just a week or so later, I’m sitting on the couch in the middle of the night wondering what the hell I’m doing. How did I let myself get so tired? So busy? So… burnt out?
Don’t get me wrong. This isn’t the first time I’ve questioned my choices as I’ve schlepped off to work while the rest of the world slept. But it is the first time I’ve come up with a plan of physical harm to get myself out of it. I actually tapped my temple as I thought about the nail making its way toward my frontal lobe. No bueno.
To be clear, I don’t want to die. I want to sleep. I want to quit school and take a vacation just to grab some shut eye. And don’t worry, it’s a thing.
So as I sit here, falling asleep at my desk, I realize I probably should’ve listened to the MULTIPLE people who warned me this would happen. Here’s the thing I’ve learned about growing up: for every one genius idea you have, you’ll have at least five dumb ones. And sometimes older people aren’t being old. Sometimes, they just know more than you.
Try It On Your Own 