Before this year, I would not have said I found my bed to be my dependable place. Having re-examined it while trying to fall asleep, I've discovered two things: my bed has been much more dependable than I've realized before, and I've taken it for granted. Because it's a source of constancy no more.
Most of my life, going to bed has been a little bit anxious -- the time when I reckoned with the present day and the coming one, and tried to fathom letting my mind lie still for the night hours stretching ahead of me. I sometimes dreaded it, sometimes met bedtime determined. This process of waking and living and sleeping is a phenomenon that appears strange and new with each day looking forward -- but seen glancing backward, blends into a pattern.
Because each night I did sleep -- at least a little -- and won the battle, new as it seemed each night. And my bed, double, four-posted, in the corner of the room by the window, was constant through four years of high school. Each night I crawled into bed, whether it was 10:15 PM or 2:00 AM, to the same view of my room, the same walls, the same perspective. Meanwhile, I grew up.
A new room is a strange thing. You grow used to your perspective as you slip into bed over time, but there's something jarring in unfamiliar walls, new lighting, and the sensation of covers not your own. You fall asleep because you must, but all the same feel disconnected. This was moving into my college dorm room, facing the reality of a semi-permanent new place. I fell asleep in this new place and ran over new settings, people, and perspectives each night until the day came when getting into bed was familiar. And then it was December, and I went home for the first time since August. And as I slipped under familiar covers to see familiar walls, I realized I felt as disconnected there as I would in a new room. For months, I had fallen asleep elsewhere with my thoughts. Not here, and this room was right where I had left off in August. I adjusted, slipped into my home life, and switched back to college life in January. The next year I moved back to the same dorm room with the same roommate, and so the pattern was set.
The pattern was set -- but this semester I moved into a different room, and next semester I will be studying abroad. Falling asleep in this new room has proved to be oddly jarring. For the first time in my life, I am fully aware that the life I am living and the place I am sleeping are not permanent, though I often act and half believe them to be otherwise. Next semester I will be in England, and as soon as the room grows familiar, it will be time to move on, to go away, and never again will I sleep there. I might return home for the summer, but how long will that be home to me?
Constants these days seem few and far between, and the future dim and unfocused. These days when I go to bed, I think of these things in addition to the happenings of the day. Suddenly, my dorm room cannot become familiar because in six weeks, I will say goodbye to it. And the view from my bed at home, with its window and walls I painted blue, will not be mine forever.
I write and think these things sometimes with fear, sometimes with fascination. Of course I've known as I've gotten older that nothing is settled or certain, that tomorrow is unknown. But I'm beginning to taste the truth for myself. I'm beginning to realize what they meant when they said "only God is constant."
So I find fear -- and joy -- in the Great Unknown that only my Maker knows, and I am glad I don't know. It's the bend in the road of Anne of Green Gables, of joys and sorrows as of yet unknown. And I'm not there yet, as I slip under the covers on these cold November nights. I am here, surrounded by the present beauty, living the present joys and struggles. I am here, and I thank God for the moment.
And so, goodnight: "In peace I will lie down and sleep, for you alone, LORD, make me dwell in safety." (Psalm 4:8)
