I would've posted my second blog a little earlier, but I've been getting slammed by work. Not that it's all bad; I'm enjoying the freedom of seeing the zero's build in my bankroll, as well as thinking about the options they create. But as the title of this blog suggests, I'm regularly getting in-touch with the weakness of my mind whilst deprived of the precious thing that even the world's best experts know very little about; sleep.
I've battled the beast that is sleep deprivation before; more than once, but I'll speak about one particular situation which was completely avoidable, not only on my part, but on the part of my employer as well. I've mentioned in my previous blog that I used to work in Newcastle. As a regular part of my job I would have to drive either north; up the coast, or west; out as far as Dubbo. In this little adventure, I was by myself and had 3 contracted jobs to do in 2 days. I was to get a hire car and a two separate hotel bookings. Sounds easy enough. On the Monday, I was to work in Taree at 6am, finish around midday, then drive a further hour to Port Macquarie, start work there at 4pm, now here's where things get..hairy. I wouldn't end up walking out of this job until 12.15am, and had a 6am start in the morning 2.5 hours north in a beautiful town known as Coffs Harbour. Fuck me. I had realised that the job would end very late at about 8pm. But I made a conscious, yet unwise decision. See, technically it's illegal to make someone work without at least an 8 hour break. I could enforce this rule upon myself, but I needed the money and saying no meant I'd lose it. Yeah nice, Jamie. Let's fucking kill yourself over $300.
So as soon as I finished the Port Macqurie job, I showered at my hotel, checked out at 12.30am and drove straight to Coffs Harbour. I gulped down a Redbull (something I'm not used to doing), put my beats on high volume and hit the highway. First hour was an absolute breeze, it was like I wasn't even tired. But then it hit me, and holy shit, did it hit like a tsunami of drooping eyelids. It got to the point where I was physically struggling to keep my eyes open. I would take a quick break on the side of the road, feel replenished, then keep going to feel exhausted again not even 5 minutes later. I got to Coffs Harbour main road at 3am and had no choice but to sleep in my car until my 6am start. It was at this point I realised that even the most luxurious car couldn't provide me with a comfortable position to sleep on, and I got little to no snooze time before the alarmed jackhammers came relentlessly powering into my skull at 5:55am. I finished that Coffs Harbour job at 3pm that day, and managed to down two more Redbulls for the trip home. (I drove about 3 hours to meet my then GF, and she gladly took the wheel back to Newcastle.) I woke up to my self and knew it was incredibly stupid to do this, and had a serious talk with my boss about future scheduling after it.
Nevertheless, I had two lessons pounded into my mind after this trip: no job is worth killing yourself (or others) over, and that the mind play funny tricks on it self as it quickly loses it's cognitive ability. I say this, as just the other day I worked from 10am till 2.30am straight. Yes, you read that correctly, 16.5 hours, only to get up at 6am to work again at 7am. While working during these silly hours, I would look at the time, work for what seemed 2 hours, then look up again and cringed when I saw only 15 minutes had passed. Unbelievable.
It doesn't take much to turn your mind to pure sludge.Your hands start getting shakes, you go pale in the skin, and your mouth and brain miss words that would otherwise be autonomous to you. Eventually the feeling of wanting sleep gets so over-whelming that you find everything indisputably funny, but at the same time, you get get incredibly short with other people around you. You seriously forget what sleep feels like, but you crave it desperately. The whole day turns into a blur and you begin to relive moments in your life from years and years ago. I noticed I couldn't concentrate on my effortless task at hand, but my mind was flicking through life old memories as if they we're yesterday. This really happened to me and all of it is automatic, I wasn't in control of any of it, I was simply grinding away, waiting for the end of work.
I didn't go home till' the end though; I didn't stay for the money, or to prove anything to myself, I simply didn't want to let others - who were in the same situation as me - down. If everyone stayed until the end, we would've finished within semi-reasonable hours, but people we're leaving left and right, and I simply didn't want to be on of those people. I've been in situations before where I've bitched-out and let my friends/work-mates down and regretted it. I didn't regret it that time though, and the truck-load of money for it felt like fringe benefits for me.
The past two days have been blissful, however. I've managed to catch up on any lost sleep. I feel great and my mind feels sharp. At least until the time comes to forfeit sleep again for something more important such as: The Tour De France (which I've always fascinated with), The Ashes Series, or just drinking late with a few close friends on an upcoming snow trip.
Get your sleep, peeps. Thanks for reading and keep up with my posts!
-Jamie
