“The early bird gets the worm” is an idiom dating back to the year 1605. Back then no one had alarm clocks, so how in the world did they know what time to get up? I guess they were more in tune with nature and the rhythms of the seasons.
My husband has an internal clock and doesn’t even need an alarm. He simply tells himself what time he wants to get up and his body does the rest. Seriously. It’s like magic.
People try to explain it away, saying, “Well, if you get up at the same time every day, of course, your body will adjust to it and you’ll naturally wake up at that time.” So how do you explain the weekends where we have to get up at the ungodly hour of 4:00 to go racing? That’s not his normal wakeup time. And yet, he’s up and dressed before my alarm clock is even thinking about going off.
I, on the other hand, do not have that particular gift. I hate getting up in the morning. I dread those first 15 minutes where my head feels like a lead balloon and I can’t keep my eyes open. I’d just as soon go stay in bed and ease into the day.
When I was a kid, we lived 45 minutes from the closest town, so we had to be up and ready to go to catch the bus to school. The way my mom would wake us up was to flip on the lights, causing momentary blindness. I would bury my head under the covers and beg for more time, but the next step was stripping the covers off the bed. If I held on too tight, I would end up on the floor with the blankets. I got to the point where I could hear her coming up the stairs and cover my head before her hand hit the switch.
Now that I’m a grown-up and can do what ever I want (hear that, Mom?) I tend to sleep in and catch the late show, so to speak. But then the day is half-way gone by the time I get up and that creates a new problem. Guilt. I spend the rest of the day mentally kicking myself about all the time I wasted and how I would already be done with this chore or that task. Blah, blah, blah.
I guess that makes me a night owl of sorts, because I really enjoy the peacefulness of sitting up late finishing a good book. Just one more page… I’m sure I’m not the only one! I’m what you call a “whale reader”. I can finish a novel in one sitting.
I know I am much more productive when I get up early. I know I should get to bed earlier. I know that I feel better and am happier when I do, but dang it! I just don’t like it.
That old bird can keep the yucky worm.