I don't know how you dayshifters do it. The crowded busses, the crowded offices,
the dark walks to work. Tough stuff. It's been a rough first week. I've learned
that I don't just have difficulty sleeping when I have to wake up early for a plane; I can't sleep worth a damn if I have to get up early for anything. And I've been trying to get up early, with some success, so that I can write some poems before work. Because after work I'm pretty wiped out. But that's probably because of the waking up to check the alarm clock forty nine times a night, paranoid I'm not going to get up in time to write. This is the downside of having been so hooked into a routine the past eight years. Like coffee, a routine can get the job done, but, as with coffee, if things don't go as planned you wind up with a junkie's headache. Right now I'm just eager to get into a nice new routine so I can stay sane through eight hours of my co-workers non-stop chatter. Don't they ever shut up?? They do not. When I worked swing shift I only had to see them two hours a day. But when I worked swing shift I only got to see my wife (awake) for an hour a day. So this is the better deal. And I've certainly capitalized on the new freedom to have a normal cultural life. In the first week I already attended a mindbending Daniel Pinchbeck reading, an amazing poetry reading up the Space Needle, and a great Halloween party. I'm not even counting all the meals I've gotten to eat with my family. When I do the math it all seems well worth the mind-created problems which aren't actual problems after all--things are as they are. Adjustments take longer than a week, right? Besides, who needs a stupid routine to write when I'll have the November 30th deadline of a 50,000 word novel hanging over me starting Wednesday? Gulp.