OPS Central - Sleep Absence

As with so many of us that prowl the night hours looking for that elusive glimpse into the underworld many believe exist, sleep is such a common everyday ritual many of us hunters do not or cannot observe without some level of difficulty. I find myself up late into the night and throughout the night unable to rest my eyes or mind for the entirety of darkness. Thoughts run ramped; ideas come and pass as though they were caught in a tornadic cycle that moves them in and out again just as quick. What is eight hours of full devoted sleep anyway?

The television is a companion on many nights which tries to funnel out all my thoughts and replace them with the less importance of the people on the silver screen. We are so technology driven as a society that even this can be cumbersome and confusing to the mind seeking refuge and diversion. The television’s shift in volume from show to commercial can be very annoying and upsetting to REM sleep. Also the difference in scenes as they switch are so dramatic with the lighting that you feel at times  you are watching a strobe light dancing around the walls and ceiling. Where is the blank channel of static and white noise that might soothe me to slumber and will that even be possible any longer with the government annihilating the need for analog broadcasting?

All the above mentioned groans of complaining bring me to this point if you find your sleep pattern resembling mine. I have found that if you have one or more of the channels that play the older types movies from the 1920”s-1950’s, that they do provide the right environment for drifting off to sleep. They first lure you with their black and white images that are soft to the eyes whether you have them opened or closed. They are all done with a soft tone that usually will not startle you with loud thugs or bangs. They also provide you the ability to close your eyes as most in our society would not watch this type of old antiquated film anyway. It makes for a peaceful transition.

So the next time you find yourself having a difficult time falling asleep, grab the remote and flip it to an old movie channel and see how many ghosts you can count floating around once your eyes close. Isn’t it an awesome coincidence that with everything we find ourselves doing in the dark that the simplest of tasks proves to be the most demanding? Sleep, do we need really need it anyway, right?     Mark Hall