For those of you in the know, aka parents of children under five, yes...that is a Wonder Pets reference. I can't help it, those silly songs get stuck in my head for days at a time. At any rate, the phone did indeed ring and it wasn't a cute baby animal on the line. It was his job. And rather than feeling the urge to help, I wanted to dive right through the handset and choke the guy on the other end.
I still deal with occasional insomnia. I'll sleep fine for weeks but suddenly get hit with a couple of rough nights. Stress is almost always a trigger. Whenever I start to feel overwhelmed and exhausted and need sleep more than anything...I'm certain to have trouble getting it. Last night was one of those nights.
I went into bed at 11:20. The prospect of sleep looked great in the beginning; I was exhausted and struggling to keep my eyes open long enough to see a TV show end at 11:30. I rolled over and fully expected to pass right out...
I entered that pre-sleep daze where your mind runs wild and flashes random thoughts and images as it de-stresses and prepares for deep sleep. That's the critical point for me. If so much as one of those jumbled images strikes a chord, all bets are off and I snap right back to an alert state. Last night I snapped. In a matter of minutes I felt fully awake, alert, and no longer tired. The clock read 11:38. Dammit.
I spent the next hour tossing, turning, sighing, and groaning as I desperately tried to find a comfortable position and turn my mind back into mush. By 12:20, Punky's dad had enough of my grunting and went in the other room to sleep. I continued my struggle and the last time I looked at the clock it was 12:46. I probably fell asleep around 1:00.
First ring. I jumped from my sleep and frantically tried to find the damn phone. Second ring. I knocked the lamp off the nightstand. I felt so dazed and confused. Third ring. I knocked the baby monitor off the nightstand. Almost drugged even. Fourth ring. I knocked a pile of magazines off the night stand. My heart was pounding in my chest. I caught a glimpse of the clock with my one half-open eye. 1:22 a.m.
The answering machine picked up just as I found the handset and attempted to say hello. A loud booming voice filled the room accompanied by the high-pitched, shrill screech that happens when the phone is off the hook too close to the answering machine. He burst through the bedroom door just in time to hear the jerk on the phone cheerfully say that he was just calling to tell him not to come to work early for overtime. It had been canceled.
It took me another thirty seconds to fully come out of my dopey, groggy, confused state. And when I did, I was wide awake. And pissed. Pissed as hell. And that effing jackass was lucky he hung up by then, or he would've gotten a mouthful.
Unfortunately for him, Punky's dad got it instead. I turned on the light to clean up the mess I made trying to find the phone and rambling strings of colorful language spewed forth like lava from a volcano.
Are they out of their effing minds? Seriously. What company calls employees at home at 1:22 in the effing morning? He was supposed to go in for 3:00 a.m. You mean to tell me they had absolutely no clue he wouldn't be needed until 1:22? What kind of effng management do they have at this place? Do they have any experience with production planning at all? How about the basic concept of respect for their employees and their families?
It's bad enough he's been working these crazy shifts and mounds of overtime for over a year now. He's exhausted and stressed. We never spend any quality time together as a family and are at each other's throats the whole hour we get to spend together most days. But the company keeps pushing, and pushing, and pushing. I don't know how much more of it we can take.
And sadly, this isn't the first time they've called him in the middle of the night. No matter how many times he tells them not to, they keep doing it. Our whole house was awake at 1:22, including my mom and the baby.
Punky tossed and turned for a bit but eventually fell back to sleep. My mom did as well. He went back to bed in the other room when I was finished ranting and raving. I, on the other hand, was right back to square one and figured I'd be up all night. I've gone to work on a half hour's sleep many times. I'd survive it, but I surely wasn't happy about it.
Sometime after 2:39 I did actually doze off...but was awake again at 3:45 when Punky woke up crying. Sigh. Again I watched the clock until close to 5:00, then managed to catch a few five-minute snoozes before the alarm started going off at six.
I'm not quite sure how I got through work today. It's all just one big blur. I guess I'll find out tomorrow when all of today's stupid mistakes made from sheer exhaustion come back to bite me in the ass. Right now I'm going to bed, and hopefully to sleep, and god bless any poor soul who dares to ring the phone tonight.
No comments:
Post a Comment