Sleepless

I am in the small bedroom next to the other small bedroom in the house I grew up in. It is almost four in the morning and I can’t sleep thanks the sixteen hour time change from my adopted home of beijing. Somewhere else in the house it is likely that my mom is awake trying to deal with her chronic shoulder pain. Pain severe enough that her chronic knee pain is no longer so visible. I’ve done this trip a bunch of times – maybe 15 – so I should be used to the jet lag, but I am not and my brain won’t get quiet when it needs to get quiet. i suspect sleep will come soon, but then the alarm will ring at six and I will be on my way to seattle. funny the things that go through my mind during these sleepless nights. i keep pushing back the work thoughts because i think they will keep my up longer. i try to play a mental round of golf in my head to no avail. i think of old friends and old girlfriends. old girlfriends not in a longing way, but in a low key way. its weird being at my parents house. they seem to have an ok life all and all. not the life i would want, but i can see their comfort in it. i here the same stories over and over again. the same patterns repeating over and over again. my parents are getting old and have been getting old for sometime. they’ve both slowed down a lot and makes me wonder how much more slowing they have in them. i keep thinking i will take down their story, but i never do, and i guess it will just pass one day. maybe next trip.