Alexander I (II.III)

Mark is starting to wake now—the impatient yawns forcing his mouth open, and all he really wants to do is sleep a little longer. I can see that he slept well; his face is rumpled, but rested. These are some of the best moments from memories; loved ones at peace, floating in a heavenly temporary ignorance of the day and what it has to bring. I think one of the most dreaded disorders must be insomnia. Those who cannot sleep are plagued by a continual experience of the awoken reality—I suppose fatigue can become so heavy that the reality fades into a ambiguous splash, but even if it’s not quite the same reality that most people have when they’re awake, it certainly isn’t the same sort of thing that those who sleep can find. It lacks nothing. That’s right. Sleep has the capacity to bring us into a sort of nothingness. No light, no sound, no movement, no conscious thinking, no dreams, no emotions, no intellect—the sleeping human may be entirely functionless at a high level. Of course, one still breaths when one is asleep—but it is involuntary, it isn’t a part of the functions that characterize personhood. There is even one philosophical theory on abortion that seems to allow for the abortion of sleeping adults, because when asleep they lack all the necessary qualities of personhood. Now you mustn’t misunderstand me, the beauty of sleep is not in the negation of humanity; because I don’t believe humanity truly is negated by sleep. The idea of aborting sleeping adults is asinine, they’re not lacking personhood, they are just not fully functioning at a person’s active capacity. No, the beauty of sleep is entirely different. Sleep may remove many positive active functions, but it also may remove a host of negative functions. People don’t tell lies when they’re sleeping, they don’t carry out premeditated acts of violence, they don’t commit revenge. Of course, those reasons are not very good for sleep being wonderful either. People can fall asleep as they drive and kill themselves and others, people can lust in their sleep (is it really lust if it’s involuntary?! demands every red-faced teen boy)—sleep can be a terrible thing, if one isn’t supposed to be sleeping, if by sleeping one shirks their very real responsibilities. No the true place of sleep’s beauty is in the state of Rest. Roll the R gently off your tongue and whisper it softly: r—e-s-t. Rest speaks volumes about our identity. It prepares us for action by recognizing that continual action is impossible—ludicrous even. It refreshes us with a darkly vibrant sense of our mortality. It restores us to our grace-filed humility. And it turns our eyes to God himself, who neither slumbers nor sleeps, but who rested on the seventh day. And that is why I have good memories of watching Mark sleep.