Drifting in the Space of Ramblings

Ramblings About Fatigue

In Memory of Oscar Niemeyer

My back hurts. My eyes are heavy. It feels like I'm over a hundred years old and I can feel my bones slowly crumbling. It's the position. The fatigue of wandering aimlessly in my astronaut suit for hours in this infinite space.

I wish death were simpler. That it would come quickly and arrive from one minute to the next. It would be easier.

Nothing in life is easy.

Everything comes in the hardest way, always.

Fatigue is when all your strength abandons you. When your body no longer functions and your mind fights to stay alert. It's an eternal struggle between brain and body. My brain is still running a mile a minute, working all the time, but my body suffers all the tension, pain, discomfort, and fatigue.

Fatigue is when your body wants to give up and your brain won't let it.

I wish I could sleep, try to rest. Many people would like to die in their sleep, not me; I panic at the thought. I keep imagining myself dead thinking I'm asleep or something, my spirit still thinking it's alive. I want to face death awake, head-on.

I'd rather be rested for all this; I just want to take a fifteen-minute nap, nothing more, just to regain my strength.

Wandering through space knowing you're going to die is like those endless nights when you need to sleep to wake up early the next day, but your thoughts won't let you fall asleep. You turn to one side, turn to the other, and your body can't find a position. You remember memories from the past, imagine what it would have been like if you had made different choices, and you sweat on the pillow, afraid you won't be able to sleep or wake up on time.

I had a night like that at the space station. I kept trying to fall asleep and started imagining a huge spaceship collecting animals like Noah's ark. I tried to imagine an animal with the letter A, another with the letter B, and so on. I tried to fall asleep imagining the animals being gathered, but when I got stuck on the letter N, I became even more restless and gave up trying to sleep and started thinking about Rachel.

I remembered her big eyes and her smile. She has a smile that could kill someone. It has a touch of seduction and a touch of serial killer. And within five minutes, I was sleeping like a baby.

It's like that in our lives too; some solutions only appear after we stop looking for them.

Maybe the fatigue will only go away when I stop thinking about it. Maybe death will only have the courage to come face me after I stop thinking about it. Maybe it's shy, unable to approach someone looking for it. Death must be a woman... With big eyes and a smile that could kill someone... With a touch of seduction and a touch of serial killer.

Yes. Death is definitely a woman.