Friday I'm ill, floored by a cold, so I'm looking forward to a peaceful morning in bed. The workmen outside the window have other ideas though, timing it so they rev their machinery up the second my head hits the pillow. They are replacing the Victorian water pipes in this area, although I was sure they’d finished, had already packed up their drilling machines and temporary fences and moved away from here. Later I look out the window to see they have moved their fences and machinery, all except for around a thin sliver of road that runs horizontal to my window. Coincidence?
Walking my girlfriend to the tube station on Saturday I tell her how, apart from an occasional 4 0’clock wake, I am no longer troubled by insomnia and haven’t been for years. That very evening, admittedly after a not very active Saturday as I’m still feeling under the weather, I find myself in bed unable to sleep. I resort to listening to music on my headphones. I start off with a few disco classics and am so awake that in a moment of madness I contemplate getting up and getting a taxi to the nearest 60’s soul night so I can dance my way to tiredness. Drunk people walk past below shouting loudly. Police sirens tear down the street. I change my mind, and the music, listening instead to late night classics such as Nick Drake.
I sit up in bed, hazy orange thoughts colouring my mind; a bright house full of people, children running around, good food on the hob, a garden with sunflowers; waiting for sleep to raise its mischievous head from wherever it’s hiding.
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