The Man in the Tuxedo
He's always with us, even at Taco Bell.
I have always had trouble sleeping. I am scared of the dark, scared of the crazy dreams my mind can come up with, scared of the things I saw on the news as a kid.
When I was in grade school, I used to have full blown meltdowns on Sunday nights, both because I was afraid to go to sleep, and because I was nervous I’d forgotten to do a homework assignment and was going to be expelled
To this day, I still have nights when I can’t get my mind to calm down. When I close my eyes and picture all of the worst things that could possibly happen to me, my family, and my friends while I am asleep. My brain plucks random scenes from movies I’ve watched in the past, and details from true crime podcasts I had to stop listening to, getting creative and being mean, keeping me awake.
On nights like these, I still try to use the strategy my parents gave me when I was little: To think of something happy. Something that makes me feel safe.
The “thing” in question has changed over the years. Sometimes it’s a happy memory, sometimes it’s a future memory—like a vacation, a concert, or just the opportunity to see my best friend in a few weeks—that I’m looking forward to. Sometimes it’s a story I make up on the spot, rearranging the world in a way that is fun and colorful and comforting.
But there is always one constant. One thing that the opposite side of my brain—the one trying to help me fall asleep—will pull out of the deck of proverbial “calm down cards.”
When I was little and growing up in church, I was told over and over that God was up there, above the sky somewhere, watching over me and keeping me safe. And what I pictured every time they said that, was a kind faced, cartoon man, floating in the sky like the inflatables in front of a used car lot. He stretched up into the sky above my church, and above the Taco Bell next door where my mom often took us to get soft tacos and cinnamon twists after service, with his arms open and his smile wide, wearing a tuxedo.
Yes, a tuxedo.
The God I picture in my head, the being that I imagine watching over me and my family and the universe, during the day but especially at night, is a cartoon man wearing a tuxedo.
And while it is more funny than assuredly comforting now that I am 33 years old, picturing it still helps me relax. It helps me feel safe. It interrupts the thoughts that are determined to make me get up and check that the door is locked for the 10th time, or that maybe the creak I just heard is a murderer in the closet rather than my upstairs neighbor checking on their baby.
It reminds me that there is a God up there (tuxedo or not) always watching over me, always with me, day and night, at church, at home, or in line for cinnamon twists at Taco Bell.