As a child, I was an early riser. I enjoyed the stillness of the house, as I got ready for
school each day. The older I got,
the harder it was to get up.
During my college years, I worked second and third shifts so getting up
an hour or two after I went to bed became out of the question. My night owl ways continued into
adulthood and the snooze button became my intimate friend.
The only time I have consistently woken up early and without
the aid of an alarm clock is on my birthday. Each year, my body instinctively wakes up within seconds of
my time of birth, 6:06am. Most
often, no one else is awake so I’m not sure why this occurs; it just does. Often, I will fall back to sleep,
reveling in the magnificence of what our brains are capable of.
When the kids were small and not yet in school, I rarely had
a need to get up early and so, I relied on the cries of an infant or a sweet
toddler’s voice asking me for breakfast to rouse me from slumber. For more than the past decade, I’ve
needed to get up early to get children ready for school, and poor Joe has paid
the price because I am a snoozaholic.
I’ve been known to hit the snooze button so many times that my alarm
clock will whimper in defeat after attempting to rouse me for more than an
hour. I set multiple alarms with
multiple different ring tones at varying times to ensure that I, GET UP
ALREADY! Joe’s least favorite
tones are a Tarzan yell and a lively bagpipe tune. I’ve hidden alarms in our bedroom so that I have to drag
myself out of bed to turn them off in hopes that, once I’m vertical, I’ll stay
that way.
Clearly, I have a problem. But, in my defense, it is a very rare thing that I am late
getting up. “Wait a minute,” you
say, “How can that be”? Easy. I have set so many alarms so early that
I’ve allotted myself a multitude of snooze slaps before I subconsciously know
when it’s time to wake up FOR REAL this time.
“Just go to bed earlier”, you say. Well, when the kids were little, I/we stayed up later just
so that I/we could have a little me/us time to spend with each other or to watch
what I wanted on television or to read or to veg or whatever else I/we wanted
to do without little people underfoot.
They are now old enough and perfectly capable of putting themselves to
bed, but they don’t. They, like
Joe and me, get distracted reading or puttering around on the computer or their
assorted electronic devices. Joe
and I, therefore, must be the enforcers of bedtime as good parents are wont to
do. Since their bedtimes get later
and later, our “us” time is less and less. And so, the snooze button gets used more and more, much to
Joe’s dismay since he has very little trouble getting up after hitting the
snooze button just once.
Bless Joe! He
is such a tolerant man to have put up with my snoozing for as long as he
has. He is also a smart man and a kind one. As I was trying to figure out what to
give up for Lent this year, he cheerfully suggested that I give up my
ridiculous over-reliance on my snooze buttons. I opted for giving up swearing, but I saw his point. It wasn’t fair of me to continually
disturb his sleep by blaring Scottish bagpipes or having a Tarzan yell break
the early morning silence and then listen to me as I jerkily slap blindly at my
clock or cell phone to turn them off only to repeat the process three or five
minutes later, depending on which alarm was going to go off next in the
sequence.
I let out a
heavy sigh and agreed with his suggestion. I dutifully turned off my alarm clock alarms (yes, I had
two), changed the alarm tone on a couple of alarms, opting for gentle morning
noises that gradually increased in volume, and adjusted the time my one
remaining alarm would go off. I
left my Tarzan and bagpipe ring tones on my alarms to get the kids out the door
because I still get distracted even if I am vertical.
On Ash Wednesday, I was up and out of bed before the serene
morning interlude even had a chance to rev up. Days #2 and 3 were the same. Day #4 was a Saturday – big training days for us and usually
also occupied with kids’ activities.
I got up with the alarm and that’s been the trend since then. I’ve only had a few days when I’ve hit
the snooze; that was the deal – no multiple snooze button attacks. Even on Sundays when I get up at 0500
to get my long runs in before church, I’ve been good about getting up.
The experts say that it takes six weeks to engrain a habit,
be it exercise, eating right, or even not hitting the snooze button. I’m halfway there but I must say, I’m
pleased with the results so far. I
love being up in the morning but then, I always have. I enjoy the solitude, the stillness of the house. At dawn, the day holds so much promise
and I love watching the sun come up.
I still struggle with the desire to hit the snooze, to snuggle in closer
to Joe for a few more minutes, but I’ve learned to resist the urge and just get
up.
My body is also responding to the new regime. I can barely keep my eyes open past ten
these days. I get the kids to bed
and generally collapse. This is
worse than when they were babies.
Maybe it’s just age - The next thing you know, I’m gonna want to hit the
“Blue Light Specials”!
The things we do in the name of religion. Ah well, it could be worse… Inquisition, anyone?
