Get Up!

On being a night person in a morning world.

Photo by Dmitry Ganin on Unsplash

I am not a morning person. I wake up tired every day. When I was a baby I did not sleep. The pediatrician told my mother I better get a night job when I grew up. I spent hours underneath covers with a flashlight reading as an adolescent. Careful not to betray the light through the door or my mother would yell through, “Kathleen! Turn the light out and go to bed!” She was the one that would shake me in the morning. “Get up! You’re going to be late for school!” Pouring an Instant Breakfast down my throat as I ran out the door.

In grammar school, you were late if you were not in your classroom by the time the Pledge of Allegiance came over the loudspeaker. As soon as you heard, “I pledge,” you were to freeze wherever you were. If I were just outside the door I would scurry in quickly, hand on my heart. Otherwise, I would be standing in the hallway, alone and frozen.

In high school, I had 33 lates my senior year. I had a friend with a car who would pick me up but if I was not there in minutes after the beep, she was gone. Did my mother give me a ride? NO. I had to beg her to write a note so I could give it to Mrs. Martinez in the office and off I would trudge the route to school. The note would say something like, “Kathleen is late for school.” No excuses. No explanations. On the last day of my senior year I turned 18 so I wrote my own note. I don’t remember exactly what it said but probably something like, “Im late.”

As an adult, this ritual continued - with only the alarm clock as my wake up call and the snooze button my addiction. There were times when I would set my alarm 45 minutes early and have it read 20 minutes late trying to trick myself to get up on time. But even in that groggy state, I could perform simple math.

It has always been an effort for me to get out of bed. People say that can’t stay in bed once they are awake. Hah! I can get up, shower, have a cup of coffee and get right back under the sheets for hours. Of course, this does not bode well for me as an adult. This world was made for earlybirds or earlybirds make this world.

One of my favorite books as a child was a story about a girl who was always tired. (Where did my mother find this book?) She went to the doctor and the doctor said to go to bed an hour earlier each night. I don’t know what happened to the parent after this but the girl went to bed an hour earlier each night, Monday - 8pm, Tuesday - 7pm, Wednesday - 6pm, etc. The picture I remember most was her in the middle of the night, sitting on the kitchen floor, feeding a mouse. I thought that was so cool.

Of course, this was not exactly what the doctor prescribed. Back to the doctor she went and you can guess the rest. (Where is this book?! Anyone?)

My husband can wake up at 6am, get dressed, and be out the door by 6:05 as I lay peacefully dreaming about more sleep. How about you? What is your morning like? Comment below if you’d like. Sweet dreams!