Transcript
SUBJECT: Sleep Article DATE: 07/08/2021 10:47:11 AM After a prolonged exhausting day of work, or even an extended night out with friends getting your groove on, we all have something in common we look forward to in order to bring these things to an end. Whether it's a stressful uneventful day, or the greatest day of your life. Of course I'm talking about crawling under the sheets and going to sleep. Before my incarceration I was a tad bit on strike from the whole sleeping thing. Due to my extremely bad habits and daring lifestyle, sleep was the absolute last thing on my ming. I always assumed and convinced myself that I'll just sleep once I'm dead. There were often time that I stayed awake for a week straight, stumbling around like something out of the Night of the Living Dead, that would ultimately lead me to crash for twenty plus hours in a single shot. This destroyed my physical body, fried my brain, and damaged many of my relationships. Today I have a completely different outlook on sleep. Sleeping in prison is by far the single greatest thing you can do in here. Temporarily I kick down these walla that have been holding me back from the real world, and I'm able to enter Dreamland. Just like anybody else who may be an active lucid dreamer out there, I'm able to take epic vacations surfing with the dolphins, party with my idols and heroes like Tommy Lee, but most importantly I'm able to spend a romantic evening with my lovely wife. Sometimes I wish I just didn't have to wake up until my time was compeltely over. It's all dandy and simply perfect, but then I wake up. I look around and realize I'm still tightly secured in my cell. Although actually being asleep is absolutely wonderful, getting to sleep in here is another story. A prison mattress is roughly an inch thick, with no direct sign of comfort, no matter how hard you may search for it. This nearly non-existant mattress is placed on a steel bunk bed frame, just for that little extra assurance of no comfort. We are issued two sets of linens consisting of sheets and blankets. But, we are not given a pillow, nor permitted to make our own. This forces us to often pile up our extra sheets, blankets, and jackets just to make shift a pillow for the night. There are only two temperatures we sleep in year round; blazing hot or frigid cold. I often wake up either curled up in a ball, or sprawled out spread eagle drenched in sweat. Oh and on top of all of this great stuff, there's another human being there with you the whole time, and a sink and toilet. Now if you look passed all of those factors, and you're able to finally fall asleep at night, it's quite delightful and pure bliss. Now there is one other thing you have to worry about when you're finally asleep, and that's the other inmates and staff around you that you are currently forced to co-exist with. There are some staff here who have an undesirable urge to tap on your window each time they pass your cell, even whenever you're sleeping. It's quite irritating, but what can you do? Personally I wake up at 5 in the morning before the rest of the general population on a daily basis, but there are other inmates who choose to casually sleep in. The majority of inmates are inconsiderate to those individuals and as soon as the doors are cracked open they immediately begin screaming, hollering, and slamming Dominoes pieces down with all their might on the tabletops. Even though I'm already awake, I don't think it's too fair or right to do this to other inmates. I often imagine what it's going to be like falling down on to a real mattress once again. I am constantly teased by Purple Mattress and Tempur-Pedic commercials on the television. I just have a feeling I'm going to sink deep into the mattress and never want to move or get up. While I constinue to await my release date, I'll rely on my dreams to take me away from here, even if it's just for the night. One day in the near future I will be waking up in a nice comfy bed, and finally be physically taken away from here.
