The three of us would stay up all night, just talking away. We
were like a bunch of high school girls at their first
sleepover.
Only we weren’t your typical high school girls.
That’s because we were college men.
The great irony of our first year here was our profession that
we just loved sleep. Irony is we didn’t get any of it ““
and we were getting tired of it.
So one day while my roommate was clipping his nails into his
desk drawer, which doubled as his trash can, I had what by all
appearances was a brilliant idea.
I decided that our sleeping patterns were somewhat less than
efficient. We would stay up until 4 or 5 a.m. talking, be exhausted
for class at 8 a.m., then not get anything done the entire day
because we always seemed to choose people over books.
I decided that our sleeping patterns had to change. It was for
the best, after all.
We would sleep during the day and work at night. This idea in
our sleep-deprived minds seemed perfectly logical at the time.
We would go to sleep around 4 p.m. or whenever our classes were
finished for the day. The recommended daily amount of sleep, eight
hours, takes us to midnight. We would wake up well rested and waltz
down to Puzzles Eatery to have our breakfast before the 2 a.m.
closing time.
Following that healthy, deep-fried meal to kick off our day, the
only friends still awake would be ourselves and our books. This
way, deep through the night, we would be forced to do our studying,
thus magically acquiring a 4.0 GPA.
Lunch would be a tad late ““ at 7 a.m. when the residential
restaurants open. Grab an omelette and some of that mush that
replaces the other two soups at what they like to call
breakfast.
Then classes would start ““ and this is the key. If you go
to class in the morning after a long night (a high school
girls’ sleepover, perhaps) you instead get your sleep in
stadium-style seating with a comfortable lullaby spoken in monotone
by your professor.
But, if you go to class at night, you can stay awake and learn,
once again magically conjuring that 4.0. As we couldn’t move
the classes to the night, we’d simply move night to the
classes. Easy.
I decided I don’t need magic to get good grades on that
online report card ““ I just need a clever sleeping
pattern.
But what about time to socialize with our floormates and go out
partying? What about our circadian rhythms? Big words and crazy
science didn’t scare us. We subscribed to the policy of
“it’s so crazy ““ it just might work.”
But it just might didn’t.
You have to give us credit for trying, though. After a night
when two-thirds of our room pulled all-nighters, we decided to put
our plan into action.
All right, maybe the term “action” is a little
misleading. It was rather lacking in special effects or fireworks
or an enchanting soundtrack. But, for three days or so, it
happened.
Until I ruined it. I had to work ““ for this very
newspaper, no less ““ from about 4 to 10 p.m. two nights a
week. That’s like staying up six hours past your bed time.
And I got cranky.
I jumped off the bandwagon. I became my own man, sleeping when I
chose. This threw my roommates off that dangerous, careening wagon,
too, and we realized everything that was exceptionally bad about my
brilliant idea.
We had no social lives, except for a cheerfully dysfunctional
relationship among us three. We still couldn’t stay awake
during class, and our professors were still monotone. And our
circadian rhythms were painfully out of tune.
So, a warning from one who has been down that road and come back
alive ““ don’t walk it. Don’t crawl it, tip-toe
it, waltz it, or shimmy it. Don’t go.
We love sleep. We all do. So go ahead and live the feeling. I
joked before about eight hours of sleep a night, but by the end of
the year I was getting eight hours on a regular basis. Never saw
that one coming.
Of course there are times when there are more important things
to do. Studying, sleepovers, even waxing your eyebrows can
sometimes edge out sleep.
But try to edge sleep back in when you get the chance. There
will always be monotone professors. There will always be late-night
parties. There will always be staying up for no reason. Such are
the perks of college.
Stay awake for them. Or compromise and catch half your
lecture.
Above all, don’t be afraid to be high school girls. They
know how to have fun. And sometimes they sleep.
Schenck is an assistant Viewpoint editor. E-mail him at
jschenck@media.ucla.edu if you want to stay up late and paint his
nails.