By M.P. PRABHAKARAN
By a strange coincidence, I happened to read Japanese-American writer Nina Li Coomes’s article on jet lag when I was going through one of my own. I read it in the online version of The New York Times, on October 25, 2022. It’s titled “The Strange Comfort of Jet Lag.” I envy that Ms. Coomes finds strange comfort in jet lag. I am one of those who, in her words, “dread and deride” it. As I grow older, dreading by me and deriding by others have been getting worse. Born in Nagoya, Japan, to a Japanese mother and American father 29 years ago, Ms. Coomes says she “has made the round trip” between Nagoya and Chicago at least 40 times. I live in New York and visit my ancestral home in India at least once, and sometimes twice, a year. Since I have been living in the U.S. longer than Ms. Coomes has been living in this world, the number of round trips I made between the U.S. and India is much higher than 40. Like her, I too have had “dayslong battle with insomnia and fatigue” – with an important difference that she went through the battle when she was a baby and I am going through it even now, at more than twice her present age. When I was young, I would get back to my work in publishing, in New York, the very next day of my return from India. The jet lag would make me doze off now and then, to the amusement of my co-workers. To the mischievous few, the dozing would also give grist for derisive comments. But never did the jet lag reach the “debilitating, dizzying” level Ms. Coomes describes in her article. It did, though, after my latest trip.
I am retired now. A visit to the New York Public Library in mid-Manhattan has been an essential, most enjoyable, part of my daily routine since retirement. Since I had been missing it during my two-month stay in India, I resumed it with great enthusiasm the day after I returned from the trip. This time, the most enjoyable part of my daily routine turned out to be one of the most unforgettable experiences in my life. After reading for a while, I fell asleep. I didn’t know how long and deep the sleep had been until I woke up and saw three security guards from the library approaching me, one of them pointing to me and saying, “This is the guy.”
Another one pulled a chair and sat in front of me. He held his palm in front of my face and said, “Can you see this? Are you OK?”
Confused and embarrassed, I asked, “What’s going on here?”
The guard who had said “This is the guy,” which I had mistaken to be accusatory, answered my question: “I came and tapped on your shoulder three times. When you didn’t respond, I thought you had passed out and needed medical help.”
When I saw a three-member emergency medical crew from the nearby hospital walking toward me, one of them pushing a gurney, I realized that he genuinely thought I needed medical help.
“Your concern is much appreciated,” I told him. “But I am fine. It may be the jet lag from my flight across half the world that caused it.”
“Are you sure you are fine?” one on the medical team asked. “We can take you to the hospital and get you checked up.”
“I am touched by your concern,” I told him. “But I am OK. Thank you.”
The unusual scene in the library drew the attention of others around. Some of them threw a suspicious look at me. Yes, jet lag can be debilitating and dizzying. It can also be very embarrassing.