Old Habits

I'm having one of those nights again.  The restless waiting kind, waiting for sleep to come find me and the million thoughts in my head.  When I used to sleep alone with a notebook next to my bed, I'd simply turn over, fumble for a pencil with some lead still in it, and stop waiting.

It's a big word--like "enigmatic"--that only feels proper in describing the sensation, like I could just keep writing and writing and writing until the lead's run out and the sun's come up and the heavy rains are just stains on the walk.  But I won't.  It won't drag on for nearly that long.  Not even close.  

No, not too many words more now.  The pressure's been released just like that.  Life's familiar again.  I have a notebook again.  This is the first writing by hand this year.  The last one's run out of pages months ago and for a while there I lost myself.  I'd forgotten the smell of the pages, the sound of the scribble in the silence.

Like a lullaby.