Love Bites: Sleepover Club

It’s not lost on me that the month of love is also the most dreadful month of the year. This dissonance always bothered me. In February, I could not be bothered to leave the house, spend more money after the great holiday pounds purge, or partake in buzzy capitalist affection.

Sometime in the past year, however, I’ve found a love practice that is perfect for this bitter month. Sleepovers with my friends have become my winter salve. A practice rooted in the ancient tradition of Girlhood, platonic sleepovers remind me of abundance and agency in a time of year when bigger forces – depression, oppression – threaten my hope for the months ahead. 

In winter, I feel the myth of scarcity everywhere. Capitalism tells me there’s not enough time or resources to live well, and the short, dark days seem to prove it. But at sleepovers, I feel this myth dissolve. When I go to sleep knowing I will see my friends in the morning, I feel drunk with time. When we share coffee, and they make eggs knowing their way around my kitchen, I think: this could be endless, and maybe already is. 

‘Revenge bedtime procrastination’ is understood as a way to delay the next day’s work – and usually this means lying in bed on your phone. But I take revenge on capitalist functioning by laughing into the night. I wake bleary-eyed and it doesn’t matter because I’ve spent the night with my friends, remembering we have choices about how to spend our lives.

One morning, my friend woke up and said they had a dream that I didn't love them. With one hand holding coffee and another holding theirs, I healed something I wasn’t even there for – and felt the power of friendship strike me clear and deep.