Sleep

Last night was the first full night of rest I’ve had since arriving in Japan. I haven’t been waking up due to nightmares; I’m just disoriented on time. And the mattress is hard. I went to the store to see if they had mattress toppers, but apparently, Japanese people like sleeping on hard surfaces. They also don’t have sheets…or fluffy pillows.

I’m trying to have a routine to help me get to sleep at relatively the same time every night. I am definitely in my bed by 10, sometimes earlier. I read 3 chapters from my Bible in English and then in Japanese. I journal some and then attempt to write a poem. Then the iPod goes on and shuffles my “Sleep” playlist.

It has definitely been lonely going to sleep in my house. It still feels like someone else’s house. It still smells like someone else’s house. Hopefully that changes soon. My routine has been thrown off. I’m used to coming home and talking with the roomies and hanging out and doing Bible time and then crawling in bed with my pillows and sheets. And then usually I get some texts while I drift off to sleep clinging to Pickles. At least I still have Pickles and Bible reading time. But it’s strange to go to sleep in a house all alone after sharing a room for the last 4 years. It’s strange to come home and have no one to talk to.

But I’ve learned to let God talk to me while I fall asleep at night. I have learned to talk to Him when I get home from work and have nothing to do until bedtime. I talk to Him while I clean the house and clean the dishes and get frustrated when the water heater doesn’t work. I ask Him to fix the water heater when it beeps and yells at me in Japanese and I can’t take a hot shower (He fixed that one and I got a hot shower like 5 minutes later). God is becoming my best English-speaking friend. I’ve even practiced my Japanese on Him…and He bears it. God is still God…even in Shibecha.