I Can’t Sleep Without Headphones
Exploring how humans cope through escapism.
Illustration: Sydney Hanson
I can’t sleep without the uncomfortable pressure of noise cancelling headphones. This pattern began during my first year at Queen’s, living in Victoria Hall. The constant invasion of fire alarms that violently threw me from my sleep led me to the only solution I could conceive: ambient scalp massage ASMR. Quickly a habit emerged, where every night I would listen to illegal audiobooks on Spotify to quiet this despicable noise. When the year ended and I flew back home, I noticed that even without the lingering trauma of fire alarms, I could not sleep without my headphones. During the day, I would relentlessly plan how to get my academic career and mental health back on track. I tried yoga, which bored me. I journaled, a hobby and routine I had already set in place. Unfortunately, to my own dismay, I discovered that the better I felt, the less impactful my writing seemed to be. Regardless, I spent my days relearning how to eat, dissolving destructive coping mechanisms, and straying away from bad habits. I became well acquainted with Google Calendar, reminders, physical planners, and SOLUS. Eventually I reached a point where my mind finally felt clear, clean, and linear. Despite it all, I still required my headphones, to escape my thoughts and fall asleep. Eventually, I accepted this inquisitive abnormality as a new fact of my life.
When second year rolled around, my days were spent emailing TAs about essay outlines, and working my ass off to receive top grades in every course. I accredited this success to my well-rested clear mind, a state made possible with my headphones. I only realized how strange my sleeping routine had become when a guy slept over and without missing a beat I reached for my headphones. You might assume that his disbelieving look would have made me realize the absurdity of my nighttime idiosyncrasy but no, I just turned to him and said “This is happening, don’t overthink it; it's not about you.” Sure, he looked puzzled, but what was he going to do? Rip my audiobook from my ears and break down in detail why I have a problem? I mean he could have, but I think my facial expression indicated that if he were to comment on the situation, he would be walking home in the Kingston winter weather.
As the weeks rolled to months, I came to realize it didn’t matter how I planned my days. Whether I was meticulous or lazy, my nights would end the same. Over the course of my second year, I never went to bed drunk, never went to bed high, but I always went to bed wearing headphones. Escapism is funny like that, similar to most coping habits in life, it operates on a spectrum of manageable to destructive. Although my method didn’t cause harm to myself, I found that it functioned as a barrier between my mind, my body and the people in my life. My mind was protected from itself, allowing my body to depart from my consciousness and travel to the subconscious, therefore preventing anyone external from entering or consequently, from leaving. It's possible that I’m just protecting my independence, or rather my ego, from encountering memories I am selfishly unprepared to revisit. Although it’s more likely that I am just scared of feeling vulnerable. Scared to feel like my skull has been removed so that my brain is on display, with each unruly passing thought echoing out to the audience of my own awareness. A demonstration far too intimate to be comfortable.
My headphones then function as both a personal intimacy coordinator and a defence mechanism. Humorously, this unnatural conundrum of sleeping on thick plastic could be compared to having sex fully clothed. In both cases, an outsider would quickly state “That just doesn’t make sense, take them off”, “Surely that can’t feel good”, “I personally would feel weird doing that”. Or they would respond with a series of questions like “How would that even work?”, “Do you do it like that every time?”, “Have you even tried to take them off?”, “Is it a religious thing?”. The similar strangeness stems from the fact that it is unnecessary to sleep with headphones, and it is completely unnecessary to have sex fully clothed. Evidently in both examples, it would be easier for skin to be bare, you wouldn’t have to bend your body, or crane your neck to make it work. You wouldn’t have to fumble underneath sheets, or feel unnecessarily warm. There would be nothing in the way that blocks you from fully engaging in the present activity. From feeling the full potential of the moment.
I find that humans face an endless battle to remain present. Unfortunately, we face the obstacle of our own uncertainty, which prevents us from tasting current air or, in my last metaphor, from fully having sex. It may sound silly, but before I fall asleep, my brain conjures up the possibility that I might not wake up the next morning. However unlikely the chances are, I still sonically drown out those thoughts of my own mortality. It’s ironic, since if I were to truthfully believe that I wouldn’t wake, ignoring that truth would seem counterintuitive. I think it’s strange how, in order to suppress fear, we distance ourselves from what scares us by whatever means necessary. Then again, I guess it’s fair that in the end- the cost of escaping fear carries a debt, of which we pay through forgetting our lives. Unfortunately, I have not yet figured out how to escape escapism, I can only reckon with the absurdity of fire alarms, awkward bedside manner, and headphones.