Lights Out

You are always there.  Lurking behind curtains and blinds, peeking at me from under doors. I try to ignore you, forget about you and pretend you are not there.  I squeeze my eyes shut as tightly as I can, willing your intrusion to stop. It’s no good: I can still feel your presence. Unrelenting and omnipresent, driving me to the brink of insanity. Well, extreme irritation, anyway.

Yes, I am talking about YOU, Mr. Sun.

I have really had it with you. What is the big idea? You disappear almost completely for months at a time, and then all of a sudden you are the life of the party around here. Only you are like the last house guest to leave;  unable to read the signs that your hosts are rubbing their eyes and yawning behind their hands. For most of June and July, you were still hanging about at 1 am, reluctant to retire. That’s right: I saw you. Peering at me over those mountains, just waiting for your moment to burst back onto the scene with all your warmth and stupid shimmery sunshine.   I am here to say that enough is enough. It’s time to start going to bed at a decent hour, a lot of us have got to go to work tomorrow.

I am sorry. I don’t mean to be rude. Honestly, I used to like you. A lot. I once spent a whole day with tinfoil under my face, trying to attract your attention. It didn’t work out well and I ended up with a sunburn that resembled a bright pink goatee, but at least we were on good terms then. As it stands now, you are seriously getting on my last nerve.

It’s the exhaustion, you see. You make me so incredibly tired. I am getting on a bit now and just can’t party the way we used to. You remember, don’t you?  You, me… a bottle of baby oil and some drugstore sunglasses…boy, those were the days. But they are over. I am 41 and I have responsibilities. Bad things happen when I don’t sleep. I lose random stuff and send emails to the wrong people and get my heels stuck in cobblestones in front of hordes of visor-wearing European cruise tourists. If I could just get a solid night’s sleep without you bugging me, this could all improve.

I didn’t move to Stavanger to pursue a relationship with you, I swear. I mean, I knew you would be around a lot during the summer, but thought that it was nothing a sleep mask and the odd whisky nightcap couldn’t fix. You have now reduced me to duct-taping heavy duty black garbage bags over my windows in some kind of trailer park version of the black-out blinds I am too cheap to buy. But then again, I also didn’t think your presence would bother me as much as it has. So maybe it’s not entirely your fault. After all you WERE here first.

I really do look forward to meeting you again under better circumstances, Mr. Sun. But until then, you might want to go and hang out in Australia for a while. I have heard they appreciate you more there. As the days get shorter and your buddy the moon starts to take your place as our almost constant companion, I will not mourn your loss. It’s nothing personal. I will be too busy sleeping.