The Sleepless project is two things: It’s a voicemail that people can call when they can’t sleep, so they can talk about what’s on their mind and hopefully get back to sleep. It’s also an art project where the creator of the project makes short videos to accompany the voice messages. She came to the project through her own sleepless nights.
On a beautiful day in April, Matthew Bryce went out to surf by himself off a remote beach in Scotland. Usually he goes out for 3 or 4 hours, and then goes about his life. This time was different.
In January I left my home for 6 months of wandering, and of course one of the main things I explored were the infinite shades of night in each new place. What I noticed more than ever is that every night is a finger print – each is unique, with no one the same as another. The sounds tell the stories.
Have you every woken up in the wee hours of the night to find that you’re gripped by fears and anxieties that just didn’t exist in the light of day?
You can lie there awake in bed, in your comfortable home, maybe even next to a loved one, and find your thoughts circling like persistent vultures. And then the morning rolls around, and it’s almost impossible to recreate the sense of foreboding that existed just a few hours earlier.
Lots of museums have regular evening hours or events, often lasting until 8 or 9pm. But I wonder – what do these worlds become in the wee hours, when the last visitor has heeded the call to leave, and the doors are locked? What transformations take place when no one is watching?
In that place where darkness and isolation meet, fear can take hold in a particularly visceral way. When you’re alone in the dark, every sense works overtime. It can feel like the darkness and the fear are interchangeable. One comes to represent the other. The darkness can paralyze you. Or you can walk straight into it.
In September 2015 the full moon crossed into the Earth’s shadow and turned redish gold. It was the first blood moon, or total lunar eclipse of a super moon, in over 30 years, and it wouldn’t happen again for almost twenty more. The moon was old and strange, and we were seeing it in a form that occurs only very rarely. It was something we had to show up for, because it wasn’t available on demand. We had to come out of our homes and out of our routines.Also, the moon that night made us look up, away from ourselves and our immediate concerns. It reminded us of the real scale of things, at least for a little while.
The night can be a desperate and lonely place. Fortunately, there’s a group of people who make it their mission to bring comfort and hope to people in the night.
The ethos of randonneuring emphasizes personal challenge and comraderie. Randonneurs share the goal of having everyone make it to the finish line. They take care of each other, because what they’re doing is kind of crazy and a little dangerous.
Picture it. You’re biking along a winding country road, 30 miles from the nearest town. The air is cool, there’s a slight wind, maybe a gentle mist. It’s three o’clock in the morning. You’ve been awake for 23 hours.
The police play an important role in civil society. Their first mandate is to serve and protect – the ultimate goal being the maintenance of social order. Often this is accomplished with out undue assaults on individual liberty. But many factors come into play in the tension between freedom and order. It can be a fine balancing act, without clear edges. And it only takes one dark night to color lasting impressions.
Some surveys suggest that up to a quarter of couples sleep in separate beds. Dave and Sue have both experienced the need to sleep alone, and while they miss things about sharing a bed all night, the arrangement seems tolerable to both of them. This is not the case for another couple I spoke to. Brooke and Bob have been struggling for years to find a solution to what seems like an insurmountable sleep impasse.
The night bus rolls through the city like a small enclosed world. You never know who you’ll meet or what you’ll see. One night, Helen Zaltzman’s bus ride home from the movies took a dark turn.
Jade Walker hates the daylight so much that most of her neighbors have rarely seen her. The sun is a personal affront to her. But she’s not disconnected from life. In fact, she sees it all. And because of her, so do we.
The stars are always there in the sky, even when we can’t see them. Why should we look? Why should we care? Paul Salazar cares, and he has compelling reasons why you should, too.
Our dreams can allow us to experience things that are – impossible. Yeah, some dreams take us where we’d rather not go. But others invite us into a world filled with joy, and ease, and wonder. They connect us to a forgotten part of ourselves. It feels realer than real, this realm we can only inhabit when we’re sleeping.
Sometimes the world of our dreams can be unsettling; even terrifying. The fear can be like an echo or a shadow of true emotion; or it can be utterly real, even justified. At times the fearful experiences we have at night can introduce questions into the nature of reality, itself. Many explanations have been offered for some of the most terrifying intrusions into sleep, but questions are not always answered, phenomena are left unexplained, there is no resolution. (Please note: This episode includes things that could be triggering for people who have experienced sexual abuse.)
Picture it – It’s dusk. We’re on a small neighborhood corner, with a faint moon starting to peak through branches of trees overhead. Kent and I are sitting behind a large battered folding table, and there’s a jar on top of it. Stop by on this beautiful evening, throw some change in the jar, and enjoy “Johnny Bear”, a new piece…
Lynne Cox has spent her life swimming vast distances and pushing herself to the edges of possibility. Since the beginning, she has thrived on exploring uncharted territories, including the ocean at night.
The night can be like the great frontier to a kid; a forbidden zone; the perfect place to explore autonomy and independence. At first it might be tempting for parents to just lay down the law. But they’re up against a lot. They’re up against the best feeling in the world.
