”Whoa Emma, hold it right there. Do you mean to tell me you flush the toilet whilst you are still sitting on it?!’ asked Mrs. Holmes.
It was the first day of drama class, I’d never done performing arts before but it was newly mandated in the school curriculum and I’d been volunteered, despite attempts to hide behind other students, to improvise the scene of a person using a toilet.
I coaxed my focus away from an empty daydream and turned my desk clock to face me, 03.43am. I sighed. Fourteen hours until my thesis deadline. I’d been awake for 2 days straight, finishing the references and drafting a conclusion, finding myself more frequently than not, held hostage by micro sleeps. My thoughts falling adrift for a moment, seemingly, only to discover that I had been staring into space, my mind lost in a vacant vacuum, no recorded thoughts, for nearly half an hour at a time. I wondered to myself if this is what it feels like for Buddhist monks when they achieve a deep meditative state. Have I accidentally mastered the art of meditation through my catatonic fatigue?