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This morning when I stepped out of the camper, the farm was drenched in fog. I was already on grumpy auto-pilot, feeling like the heavy bearing getting bounced around the ping ball machine, which might hit it’s mark and might not. So, hitting that fog like a wall, I started to turn right around and crash back on that bed.

The morning and I had already had similar run-ins: the stupid alarm hit me in a heavy cycle of sleep and then fell on the floor when I reached to shut it off…that right there is enough discouragement as to the trend of the day to make me roll over and groan back into slumber. My nose was cold while the rest of me was warm. I’m not a doctor or anything but it seems to make more sense to tuck such a nose UNDER THE COVERS rather than make the whole body match it in chills.  Trying to go through my daily inventory (what day is this? what do I have to do first? who will be the most mad if I screw up?), I couldn’t remember if this was Thursday or Wednesday, which means, I was having a hard time accessing my memory bank from the night before. Vespers, a summerish night, a long drive home, bad writing news waiting for me.

“Oh Yeah”. Bad writing news. Right before bed last night I got an email that confirmed what I’d already suspected: all the copy I finished on Tuesday has to be redone. I did what the client wanted but not my boss; if I redo it my boss will be happy but not the client. Tuesdays are writing days; this has to be coepecitic by the end of today. It was a crappy lullaby.

I guess I’m disciplined enough to make myself get out of bed at o’darkthirty. I’ll walk across the dewy lawn to the main house, make scratch waffles before my brain is really on, pack 3 nice lunches and get the kids to school on time. My kids have learned I’m not very verbal, proving the inborn intuitiveness of children.  I kiss and hug and help them pull on clean clothes and butter bread and drive, but I don’t talk about it or anything else while I’m doing it.

Babies are smart: they sleep when they’re tired and they wake when they’re not. They seem to keep this until we impose something else on them. For some, maybe it’s daycare (drop off at 7 am?). Others, it’s school (drop off at 7:30?). As homeschoolers, we delayed this change a long time. My kids woke when they were ready until a much later age than many others. Which meant, so did Mom.

Early risers make the world go around I suppose. They insist on squeezing more productivity out of the day and force it on the rest of us. I’m tired (oh am I so tired) of the perception that someone is only valuable if they are productive, and they can only be productive if they start every day at the crack of dawn. Grey productive types need Creatives sometimes, and we need our rest.

What happened to the world where the early risers were the bread bakers and donut makers? Monastics rise early to pray but what’s so special about that anymore when the rest of the country is up along with them? Shouldn’t we all sleep a bit more so the dawn is quiet and calm? Are we messing up the birds by beating them to the sunrise punch? Would it be a big deal if we went back to a 9-5 life and slept an extra hour each morning?

Maybe the recession is going to teach workaholics a thing or two. Maybe, to cut overhead costs, places will have to be open for a shorter duration, giving us more time at home and less time in traffic. Maybe “Economic Turndown” is just another way to say, “National Burn Out”, or “Take THAT Morning People”! After all, you think the stock exchange is going to notice today if you spend another 10 minutes in bed, drink an extra half cup of coffee, and walk outside to breathe fresh air on your break? Probably not, but I bet you’d smile more. I’d bet with enough days of that the bags under your eyes would firm and disappear. You might even get more work done because there’s no more dazed moments staring into space wondering what day it is.

Oh wait, that’s me. It’s Thursday, March 12. I’ve got to write, get to class (real estate law this week; I’m getting my Paralegal Cert), talk about clouds to my four year old, update two blogs, put out a few client fires, dodge anything remotely emotionally stressful on purpose, get groceries, and decide on dinner for 7.

Is there really anything about that couldn’t have waited until 9?

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