When I Can't Sleep, I Blog

I'm breaking all the cardinal-rules of trying to go to sleep: eating, listening to rock music (U2, to be more specific), and looking at a bright screen.

This whole Amy-not-going-to-bed-until-at-least-two started last week. I came home from a jam, and I was so excited, I just couldn't sleep. I slept great the following night, but then my pattern was messed up after being out until two in the morning Friday and not going to bed until three in the morning Saturday. I'm not sure I like it. I like to sleep.

I recently realized several things causing my insomnia:

1. Running. I'm not running. Exercise definitely helps you sleep, at least running helps me. I haven't gone for a run in a while. A long, long while. Blame it on my schedule, but it's my own fault. I'm not exhausting myself the way I should be in order to sleep the way I want to.

2. Midterms. I've been thinking so much about midterms that they could easily be keeping me up at night. I have one tomorrow, I mean today. It's Ear Training Part One: Dictation. I am horrific at dictation. Give me a guitar, I'll play you back the melody after listening to it once, maybe twice. Make me write it down, it's torture. This time I was smart: I scheduled a tutoring session right before my exam. I'm gonna walk in, and have my tutor play me Lydian and Mixolydian melodies for an hour. I can't think of a better way to prepare for it. Why didn't I think of this before? Paul Stiller used to (he still might) have dictation classes for Ear Training 1 and 2 on Wednesdays at 4. I went to as many as I could, and on my final dictation I got a B+. Practice makes perfect, it's just hard to practice dictation.

My other midterm I'm concerned about is Sound Reinforcement. I'm not so worried now. We reviewed in class today. As long as I do some prep work, I'll be fine.

3. Other things. I have so many little things to do. My lists are everywhere and unaccomplished, which is so unlike me. I have to get back on track. Not that I'm derailed, but my wheels are coming a little loose. Not in every area. Usually my guitar chops get lost in the shuffle (oddly enough) when I'm at school, but I've been spending a lot of time playing. Which is great. I didn't play nearly enough my first two semesters.

I've been thinking too much lately about everything. I think I'm thinking about sleeping too much.

I'm listening to U2's Zooropa, and I feel like it's December of 2008 during finals week because this album was my soundtrack. My mom called me sometime that week, probably that Tuesday, to tell me that she never bought the plane tickets to fly to DC for my cousin's wedding, but it ended up being the best mistake she ever made. A massive blizzard was headed for Boston the day we were supposed to fly. We would have missed our flight. Having never bought the tickets, we got a last-minute deal to fly out on Thursday and we ended up staying at the Willard and eating at Old Ebbit's Grill that night. It's amazing how I associate all that with Zooropa. And the Devil Wears Prada. I watched that movie eight times that week I think. I would put it on whenever I could. Ask my old roommate. Throughout November and December it was on all the time.

I could go on for a while now, but I need to stop myself and try and sleep.

Thank you for reading my late-night ramblings. I hope there are fewer of them.

Meanwhile, Back at the Ranch...

After 34 days of being away, I am finally back at Berklee.

I had a good break. It was fairly unproductive, but that's what a break's for, right? Time off. I'm not sure if I needed it, or if I even wanted it, or if I benefited from it. At the moment I feel as if I did not benefit from over a month off of school. It's weird being back. Maybe it's because I've only been here for five and a half hours. Hopefully it's only because of that. There's a lot to be done in the next three and a half months, and until this feeling of uneasiness goes away, a lot will not be done. It will. I just need to get the ball rolling, then I'll be fine.

I'm eager to start classes. I missed a few while I was at the Inauguration--which was really cool and really cold. Tomorrow I have Harmony, Arranging, and Legal Aspects of the Music Industry tomorrow. Should be a good day. I got all my stuff together when I got back. My life is organized once again. I'm surprised I managed to get it all together in a short amount of time. I have some laundry to do, but that's about it.

Actually, I gotta play guitar.