A lighthouse at the end of a long day, when you are waiting for something — for jet lag

The story, in full

There is a logbook open on the table with the last entry in someone else's handwriting. Your coat is on the hook by the door, still wet at the shoulders. The room at the top is small, round and warm, with a kettle on a ring.

The light goes out across the water and comes back, and goes out again. The lighthouse turns once every fifteen seconds, and you have stopped counting it. The wind is doing a low, steady thing against the glass.

Now feel your whole body at once, lying here, being held up. Let your hands be completely still.

Let everything you were holding today stay on the floor beside the bed. Feel the top of your head relax into the pillow.

A ship passes in the distance with its lights on, and then it does not. Below, the sea is doing what it does at night, which is mostly nothing.

Let your forehead go cool and smooth. Feel your wrists loosen.

Let your toes stop holding on to anything. Let your feet get heavy first. Heavier than they need to be.

There is a chair pulled up to the window that fits exactly one person. The window is thick and slightly green at the edges.

Let your thumbs rest where they landed. Feel one shoulder go heavy, then the other.

The tea in your hands is too hot to drink and you are just holding it. The lighthouse will keep turning whether you watch it or not.

Feel your cheeks let go. Let your upper arms fall wherever gravity puts them.

Notice if you've been frowning at your own thoughts. If you feel restless, that's a feeling, not a failure.

Let the pillow take the whole weight of your head. Let the back of your neck lengthen out.

Let the room get slightly further away. Let your breathing do the rest.

Let the sound of this go soft at the edges. The words can start to blur now. Leave it there.

Sleep. Slower. Nothing needs deciding tonight.

Waiting is dead time you can spend on this instead.

Let everything get quiet, including this.

18 paragraphs, roughly 3 minutes read slowly aloud. Written for sea, still.