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I can knit a pair of socks, a scarf, a sweater. If I drop a stitch I can pick up the stitch, unravel a few rows, and re knit it. I definitely know how to fix a raveled sleeve.
Once I'm comfortable and wishing I would fall asleep, I start counting, and quote Shakespeare out loud to myself, silently, so as not to wake my husband: "One-ten-thousand --'Sleep that knits up the raveled sleeve of care."
I pronounce this number (
it takes a second to say it), and then I say each word of the Shakespeare as if I were in an auditorium, speaking clearly, communicating each syllable, each consonant.
Next, lying there, I recite, "Two-ten-thousand. Sleep that knits up the raveled sleeve of care." Once again, with actress poise, I articulate each word.
Then, "Three ...um....sleep ...knit ... etcetera." I'm slightly impatient, not bored, but I speak my Shakespeare sentence much faster
"Four --." A dark thought, a touch of anxiety sneaks in, I can't help remembering something I don't want to think about. A voice on the news, a photo, a face, accident, crying parents ...
"FIVE ..." I remind myself to enunciate. I'm more or less reliving, reviewing an event that's waking me up -- protesters, tear gas, missing baby? Did the mother kill it?
"SIX" -- I begin to see a bunch of words forming as if my brain is a computer screen filled with letters that are spelling out words that I typed during the day ... Pets, Vets, candidate, commentator making anti-Obama remarks.
Soon I mutter, "Seven -- dammit, this is dumb -- this isn't working -- I'll never fall asleep ..." But while I'm complaining, I repeat "sleep that knits ... " scribbling bleach, Easy Off, Windex on a shopping list.
I murmur, "Eight. I should get up, make some hot water cocoa, what's in the fridge, anything to snack on? Why don't I write a post about biggest losers, diets, drinks, lying ads ...
Nine? Or am I on "ten?" I chant.. "TEN ten thousand, sleep that knits ... " while wondering if I'm on "eleven," deciding that next time I'll chant TWELVE TEN THOUSAND, RAVELED SLEEVE, and then, then ...
I more or less keep going, battling black thoughts, occasionally reliving an event, sometimes seeing typed letters. Words I wrote last month start mixing in with yesterday's words. I reach, eyes closed, for a sip of water from the glass next to my bed -- sip, change positions and start again with "one ten thousand. " And then -- well -- if I get to 30 ten-thousand, I get up. I head for the kitchen where I make hot water cocoa, and watch on the kitchen TV some late-night program on cosmetics, Bosley hair, cancer care, bed linens, while sipping my cocoa and channel surfing peevishly till the cup is empty. Off goes the TV -- off I go back to the bed and knitting, not knitting, complaining that sleep isn't knitting up anything, before I doze off and sleep, sleep.
Does my Shakespeare chant work? Does "sleep" knit up the raveled sleeve? Not reliably!
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Maybe tomorrow I'll try "To be or not to be, that is the question --whether 'tis nobler in the mind to suffer the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune, or take arms against a sea of troubles?"
Yow. I'm picturing the Titanic ...
I
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'm going back to knitting ...