Sleepless in Spanish

Last week when I went to the east coast, I took the red eye—-not fun but sometimes a necessity.  No one wants to arrive at your destination feeling  like a zombie.  So I had a glass of wine before the flight, and on the plane I did what I always do:  I got in a comfortable position with my pillow, took off my shoes,  shut off the light,  shut my eyes…….and I kept them shut…… even though I was wide awake.   For the whole flight.

And though I’m prone to exaggerate, this time I was not prone and I am not exaggerating.

A normal person reading this is surely wondering—why doen’t she just take an Ambien and get some sleep?  Which makes sense.  Only not, for some reason, to me.

For some reason, I’m afraid of sleeping pills—and I have never taken one.

Years ago I had a job that involved a trip to Russia to shoot a video—-and I flew over with a few of the people also working on the project.

The first leg is an overnight polar flight, from Los Angeles to Copenhagen; and I’m kind of jumpy since my kids are still small and this is the furthest and longest I’ve ever been away from them.

The flight takes off, and pretty soon the guys  pull out their bottles of sleeping pills and offer one to me. I don’t know them well, and obviously they don’t know me either. I say no thanks.

They shrug, shut their eyes, and I watch them all sleep the entire way to Copenhagen—since I’m wide awake the entire flight.

Later that night, on the ground, we go out to dinner and  get to know each other a little better and after some wine they ask me—-so why didn’t you take a sleeping pill?

Maybe they think I was worried about taking drugs from strangers but that wasn’t it— I tell them the truth—-“I didn’t want to be knocked out.  If the plane crashes, I want to be alert. ”

They stare at me like I’m crazy.

“Are you crazy? We’re flying over the North Pole—if the plane goes down in the Arctic, the last thing you’d want to be is conscious.”
Now I’m very conscious—- of how ridiculous that must sound.

Only nothing changes.    Even when I get cancer and my doctors prescribe sleeping pills—which I don’t take because I don’t want to take unnecessary drugs……while I’m having radiation and injecting poison chemotherapy into my veins on a constant basis.

And that’s where it stands— up to the red eye last week and now as I’m about to board a long overnight flight to Argentina.   As usual,  I’ve got Ambien in my bag; the question is whether it will make it into my body.

I wonder how you say “sleepless” in Spanish.