The family curse has struck. I thought it had skipped my generation; my brother and I seem relatively close to normal. But as I lay in bed last night I knew I was to suffer the same fate as my ancestors: I will never sleep again.
No one on my dad's side of the family sleeps. My father hasn't slept for longer than six hours a night in years. Instead, he grades papers, lifts weights and eats all the ice cream down the middle of the bucket, leaving me and the rest of the family only the sick crusty stuff on the sides.
My grandma would be the last one to bed and the first one up, and to this day I am convinced she slept standing up in the kitchen, because she always had a mountain of pancakes waiting in the morning.
And my great grandfather had the thickest Irish accent I've ever heard, so although he would always try to tell me what he did on those sleepless nights, I never really understood.
Now it's my turn. I am the one lying in bed, tossing and turning and finally getting up to eat all the ice cream in the house, scooping down the middle just to piss off my roommates. The way I see it, Confucius said, Those who sleep well eat shitty ice cream.""
But unlike the generations before me, I don't use my sleepless nights to work out, cook for my loved ones or do other remotely useful things. No, I sit in bed trying to figure out the name of that movie about the slave ship that Matthew McConaughey was in.
When I finally get up and IMBD it - it's ""Amistad,"" if you were really that curious - I realize that I am now fully awake and will not be getting back to sleep anytime soon. Unfortunately for me, it's about 2:30 a.m, and I have several hours before anyone else in the apartment begins to move.
For a while I try to be productive. I tell myself I will paint masterpieces, learn Chinese or re-enact the underpants scene from ""Risky Business"" with my headphones on. But, of course, although my brain thinks these are all splendid things, my body mutinies and refuses to use any muscles beyond moving from the bed to the couch and from the couch to the refrigerator.
So what do I do with the hours upon hours of free time? Usually I bemoan my family's legacy of insomniacs and wish I at least had a reason to be awake. Why couldn't I be a creature of the night with sweet super powers? Or perhaps be able to craft an elaborate papier-mà ¢ché cake for the male stripper to pop out of for my friend's birthday? Or maybe fight off the romantic pleadings of the oh-so-awkward yet irresistible Michael Phelps? Yes, I know the nation's love affair with Mr. Phelps ended weeks ago, but when you haven't slept in the weeks since Beijing, you start to lose your sense of time.
When I finally get over the self-pitying portion of the morning, I begin to kill time the way any normally functioning person would. I Facebook, I watch TV and I try to learn all the lyrics to cheesy 90s songs that no one understood. Yes, I discovered that ""Semi-Charmed Life"" really was about crystal meth, the Barenaked Ladies needed a new set of golf clubs with tiny nubs and an MMMBop is a measure of time. You would be surprised at how clear it all becomes when you listen to these gems on repeat for several hours.
But then, as the sun begins to rise, I realize that I have not truly inherited the curse of my forefathers.
See, when they got no sleep, it never mattered. They were a strong and determined people who didn't need sleep - they went out and seized the day without it. I, on the other hand, am a lazy creature who will proceed to fall asleep at work, in class and quite possibly crossing the street if I have to wait too long at the stoplight. Someday I will find a cure for the curse, but for now I will inject a near-lethal dose of coffee into my system and hope for the best.
If you have found a way to inject coffee directly into your veins without incurring third-degree burns, e-mail Megan at mcorbett2@wisc.edu.
