The long, sleep-deprived drive home.

Tonight Logan did an uncanny impersonation of me arriving home at 6:45 this morning.

He grabbed my purse, went out on the porch and pounded on the door several times. (I don't have a house key and the doors were all locked when I drove up. I don't need a key because we don't lock our doors. Rob us blind! We deserve it!)

When I opened the door he came in, threw the purse on the sofa and said, dramatically, "I am so fucking tired, I need bed."

Then he hurled himself through the house to the bed. It was like walking only with more forward leaning. He mimed pulling off a bra and necklace and laid down on the bed like a corpse and said, pretending someone was trying to kiss him hello, "I need sleep please don't touch me."

And, though I hate to admit it, it was true. Our happy reunion involved my sleep psychosis.

I left San Francisco at 10pm Sunday night, after walking with a group of people (a few of them exceedingly adorable) around the city all day.

My flight was full and full of children. Full of very tired, very cranky and very loud children. I'm glad I'm done having kids because the remaining eggs in my ovaries gave up somewhere over Montana and hitch hiked into Canada away from me and Northwest Airlines.

My flight was also lacking a travel pillow (I forgot mine at home) and a blanket which meant sleep was a sort of yogic event. My favorite position was 'Pretzel Neck' and it was extraordinarily unpleasant. It involved drool running down my face and the weight of my head jerking me awake every three minutes, so I decided to read a book instead of sleep.

By the time I arrived at the shuttle to take me back to my car at 5 o'clock in the morning I had the look of a wild animal. When the shuttle driver asked me where I parked I said "3" which was neither the lot I parked in, nor the row I parked in. I pulled that number out of my crackling brain and left it on the dashboard.

When the driver told me how hot it's been here, and how it was slated to be 108 with the heat index all week, I flashed to the breezy air conditioned goodness of San Francisco and then I started to cry. I survived almost all the weekend without tears, Alice tried but the closest she got to tears was saying two words to me: "Good" and "Bye". Detroit finally did me in with it's rain forest impression.

We found my car and I realized I had left it unlocked since Wednesday. If you want to rob someone, you should probably find me, I'm practically traveling through life leaving a bread crumb-like trail of ways to rip me off.

I've been to and from Detroit Metro 6 times in the last 6 months. I drove away from the Airport and when faced with my first exit choice I honestly didn't know if I should head for Detroit or Chicago on 94. I thought maybe we'd moved to Chicago while I'd been away?

I drove past the first exit I needed to take and had to turn around. After that I took the most bizarre wrong turn of my journey which took me almost one hour out of my way and the delay caused me to be tossed into the indignities of rush hour traffic..

I've lived here my entire life and suddenly I couldn't understand why Lahser road was spelled that way, why not Lasher? Why am I even on Lahser, I don't live anywhere near here. Why are the exits on the right and not on the left? What is the speed limit? Why am I still listening to Drew and Mike? Who's driving this car?

My sleep deprivation took over with each passing minute and even when I pulled into my driveway I didn't entirely recognize my house. Had it always been this way? Why was it locked? Why don't I have a key to the house I've lived in for the last 8 years?

And so I went to the front porch, knocked on the master bedroom window off the porch and when Logan opened the door I threw my purse on the door, flung myself through the house and hurled my body onto the bed. Exactly like Logan showed me tonight.

Because I am, unfortunately, not a robot.

(The kids heard my flinging and woke up precisely upon my arrival at 6:50 am. If I were a better, less sleep deprived parent I would have been thrilled to see them. Instead I felt happy to see them but also sorrowful for the sleep I would be giving up in the name of love.)

Comments

[Lassa]

Melissa, glad you made it home safely. I'm so happy I had the opportunity to meet you this weekend!

[Lena]

Melissa, I so wish I hadn't been a complete social reject this weekend and had actually spoken two words to you. Gah.

And those words would have been: pretty shoes.

(Perhaps I'll Photoshop my head into one of Yvonne or Amalah's pics with you. Is that sad? HINT: Yes.)

[Kim E]

I'm so glad you're home and looking forward to your Blogher play-by-play :)

[Christine]

Glad to hear you made it home safe. Can't wait to hear all the fun details. And I was just checking out Sweetney's pictures and you look fabulous. It made me think back to when you said people were making comments that Logan was out of your league. Those people are pot smokers. Your beautiful!

[dutch]

I'm going to wait until you and logan go to the bar and then I'm going to break into your unlocked house and steal that "golf courses of the world" wallpaper.

[Antonia]

If you anaesthetise your tongue, drop your voice an octave and say "Tired" while thrashing your head from one shoulder to the other, you will sound like I do when Ian kisses me goodbye at Jesus-Christ o'clock every morning.

Welcome home to your own bed. Mmmmmmm bed.

[A]

How could you possibly question why you were listening to Drew and Mike?!

Suburban Bliss and The Drew and Mike Show are my two favorite things about the D!

[chris]

It was so nice to meet you.

And I was supposed to leave my car unlocked in the long term parking lot because the key no longer works in any of the doors. But I don't listen to my husband when he speaks.

So I was forced at 11pm last night to crawl into my trunk and use the ice scraper through the hole in the back seat to try and reach the lock.

And I was so tired I was half hoping someone would shut the trunk and kidnap me, just so I could nap on the way to where ever they would take me.

What a welcome back to my real life.

[Momtowolf]

so how many hours did you sleep?

glad your home safe.....

[Very Mom]

I just woke up and I've been home since Sunday. What an overwhelming experience. I'm not sure how to write about it. Must go lie down again.

[jennster]

MELISSA! SUBURBAN BLISS!
it was super nice to meet you! :)

[Izzy]

Jennster is way more ballsy than me. That might be why I love her so very much.

But truly, I'm jealous. I so wanted to talk to you but as I posted, I didn't want to intrude on your conversations just to slobber all over you and fan-ishly proclaim that you rock and that your haircut rocks, too.

So am I dork because I didn't do it? Or because I wanted to?

You see my dilemma, no?

[Karen Rani]

Melissa,
I'm so sorry I acted like an ass. Hopefully you don't remember, in which case, that is a good thing. I really am such a toolkit sometimes.
:)
Karen

[julia/tickytacky]

You are in FINE form, making me laugh out loud like an idiot!

[laurie white]

Oh girl, I had the same experience when I got to my car at the Baltimore airport. So confused. I got to the end of the garage exit ramp, and didn't know which way to go! I knew I'd seen this place before, but had no idea which way I'd come in, or surely which way I should leave! Crazy. I sat there for a minute, and finally chose "left", which happened to be right. Yes. I kept touching my face on the way home, as if to say, "Are you still here?" So weird.

Just found your site - have no idea who you were at Blogher as I've never read you before, but glad you had a good time with friends.

[Sarah]

Why oh why are human heads so heavy? Why must they snap forward or back as we try to sleep in public? Oh, and having done two long haul flights on the same aeroplane as horrible bratty children, I think there should be the option for fellow travellers to send them to the hold.