Confessions of a Casual Perfectionist: Day 27

It’s NaBloPoMo Day 27!

Today’s confession: I am a Night Owl. In a perfect world, I’d get up at the crack of Noon.

If given a choice between getting up early to do something or staying up late to do it, I will choose the late-night version. Hands. Down.

In a former life, I was forced to be a morning person. I needed to be presentable and agreeable before the crack of dawn. I did it because I had to, but not because I wanted to. You do the things you have to do when you have to do them so that one day you can do the things you want to do when you want to do them.

What I lacked in genuine civility and cheer, I made up for in caffeine. The result was the same, and no one knew that I was really a Night Owl in An Early Bird’s feathers. I did what I had to do, and when I could move on, I did so at the speed of light.

They say the Early Bird gets the worm, and I’ve always felt sorry for those poor worms.

If you must know, in a perfect world, I’d get up around 11am to start my day. Lunch would be my breakfast. I’d do what I needed to do during the daylight hours, and then at the end of a “normal day,” after dinner and some quality time with my loved ones, I could easily write [or play on the Internet] into the wee hours of the morning.

Lather. Rinse. Repeat.

But, it doesn’t work that way. Morning comes when it comes, regardless of when I’ve crawled into bed. We were blessed with a child that sleeps late into the morning, but even my optimum schedule is too unrealistic. Domestic obligations will not allow me to have the schedule I want, but we do run on a later schedule than most, so I really can’t complain. It works for us.

People assume that Night Owls can’t sleep, that we’ve got some sort of problem that keeps us awake. Maybe some are like that, but I’m not. I don’t suffer from insomnia. I can sleep if I want to; I just don’t want to. I find other things to do at midnight and beyond.

The house is wonderfully quiet at that hour, and I can focus, the words slipping from my mind, through my fingers, onto the keyboard, and appearing on my monitor. I’m not interrupted in my projects by a wonderful helper, and even the kitties are asleep. The juggling I do during the day is put on hold, the different colored balls resting in the basket labeled “Tomorrow.” They’ll be waiting to be picked up where we left off.

I’ve adjusted to getting my work done in the midst of sunlit chaos, too, but there is something so magical about the new hours of the morning, the hours just after midnight. These dark, fertile hours don’t really belong to the day before, and they’re not yet claimed by the day to come.

Only the Night Owls know where to find this magic, and it is awesome.

Even the Early Birds aren’t awake yet at that hour, so the worms are safe for at least a little while longer.