No rest for the wicked

It’s 03:20 and I’m wide awake. Too much in my stomach and too much on my mind.

I had a short, sweaty, uncomfortable sleep where I dreamed we'd been given a difficult task. I think it was N and me. The only thing at our disposal an old crane. It was a tower crane, but had the dark, rusting cab of a steam locomotive. We climbed the ladder to get inside.

It was constructed from solid steel in the heavy way that isn't done anymore – and this thing was really built. But once in the cab, we could feel the structure sway.

The fire was not long dead. Steel carcass retaining its heat like a freshly killed animal. Steam remained in the boiler, but insufficient to get the job done. Not enough to operate the machinery. We knew we shouldn’t be there and that if we did try to run this leviathan we'd draw attention. The frustration was palpable.

In the dim interior, the controls were strange yet familiar. The ghosts of those who had laboured there were with us. You could sense an atmosphere of hard work and sweat. You could smell it. It was honest work.

Then I awoke. And the day ahead was on my mind. The alarm would sound in a few short hours and I would have to be on my mettle. I went to the kitchen for frozen vodka to numb my brain and send my stomach to sleep. Sleep! Ha! No rest for the wicked, they say.

I commit these thoughts to you in the hope we might exorcise them.