I sometimes forget how active the city remains, even in the middle of the night.  I’m up at nearly 3:30 am, completely unable to sleep.  I had a cup of coffee this afternoon around 2:30 pm, after nearly two weeks without much caffeine of any stripe (coffee just isn’t the same when I have a cold and can’t smell it) and that single cup of La Colombe is extracting it’s revenge for my long absence.  I had forgotten how much caffeine effects me when I’ve gone without it for an extended period of time.

Back to the city noises.  I’m sitting on the couch in the living room, with one of the big sliding windows cracked to let in some of the cool night air.  The sky looks brown and a few offices are still lit up across the way.  The breeze carries the rattle of trucks as they bounce over the pockmarked city streets.  A bus hums as it accelerates and then brakes with a squeal.  An occasional honk divides the background buzz, possibly a cab trying to solicit a fair from some lone pedestrian.  The mammoth cooling fan on the roof of the Stock Exchange Building raises the level of the white noise to a nearly distracting level.  When it finally shuts off, the air seems to shudder for a moment, as if even the molecules of oxygen find relief in the momentary silence.

I imagine my body will feel a similar sense of relief when I finally sleep.