Are you a morning person?

It seems I have always been a morning person. My functionality, what is left of it, is much better very early in the day. By functionality, I am referring to my energy, my enthusiasm for life in general, the clearness of my thoughts. Unfortunately, there are certain aspects of my being that have deteriorated in the first part of the day, specifically structural in nature. Hauling my old, tired ass out of bed at this age has become much more of a chore.

I am wondering if this morning person/late person thing is strictly an environmental trait, or is it something you are born with. Certainly when you are very young, you are not a morning person. For instance, I can remember being able to sleep until 11:00 or 12:00 when I was a kid. As a child, I relished the weekends when I could languish in bed until my mom or dad rousted me out of my slumber. “Are you gonna get up some time today?”, they would yell at me through my bedroom door. Even after getting out of bed that late, it would still take a while until I was coherent enough to function. And that slow recovery period was long before my party-hearty 20’s. Staying out until 3:00 am drinking and smoking doesn’t count when it comes to this research. Self-induced morning stupors screw up the “curve”!

Recently, a 50-ish blog friend of mine mentioned that she is not a morning person. Does that mean she is an evening person? I’ll have to ask her someday. And, has she always not been a morning person?

Lifestyle and health have a lot to do with your daily biorhythm schedule. But that is a given. I don’t think anyone would debate that. Even I have much more energy when I drink my water, eat healthier, and stay active.

During my radio days in the 70’s and 80’s, I had to be in front of the microphone at 5:00 am...alert and ready to be witty and marginally entertaining. That required me getting up no later than 3:30 am, arriving at the station in time for a little show prep, ie, pulling the overnight news service copy and making coffee. The latter being the most important. I was literally “rockin’ and rollin’” by 5:00 am, Monday through Friday, for many years. Then on weekends, I would find myself awake and ready to roll (no rockin’) at 5:00 am. I could not sleep past that time...and still today, most of the time, cannot. I can count on one hand the times I have slept past 7:00 in the past 20 years.

During the fifteen years or so I spent in restaurant management, my work schedule was all over the place. I worked early mornings as well as late late nights, sometimes until 3:00 am. Even during these time periods, I would never sleep past 7:00. So, I guess I am truly a morning person...and always will be.

My 27 year old, Seattle-ite daughter works a “normal” weekday schedule. Including a 40 minute commute, she reports to work at 8:00 am. Yet, she can sleep in on weekends with no problem. She and husband Roth are very socially active. They enjoy a lifestyle that includes late night dining, socializing, and entertaining on a regular basis. Loretta and I have tried that route. In fact, even our intimate, late-night dinners at home with friends are short-lived! They all “bail” by 9:30...even when we do actually “entertain” them, ie, provide post dinner games, music, and caffein-infused aperitifs. Even our peers can’t stay up late any longer. And, for the most part, we’re ready to “pack it in” early as well. But once in a while, it would be fun to hang out late and “party”. Ain’t gonna happen...unless we’re doing a wedding!

Photographing weddings has reintroduced us to staying up late. In fact, those days when we do a wedding start very early and last until midnight or so. And you know what? We can hang with the best of them. And those wedding gigs are usually nonstop. We are on the move constantly all afternoon and all evening. Of course, we are totally trashed the next day...but we can still do it. And those mornings after, I sleep in until 7:00!

The bottom line for me is, if I am busy then my enthusiasm and energy level remains high...even in this dilapidated physical, mental, aged state. My fuel tank is half full, but I’m still going (notice I didn’t say “half empty”?).

We are empty-nesters, save for three furry “children” named Sparky, Lucy, and Sammy. They wake us up at 7:00 am every single day. Even if we wanted to stay in bed longer, it is not possible at home. Even during weekends away in a motel, curtains drawn tight, no phone ringing, no slobbering wet muzzles in our faces...we are up early. In these cases, we are just anxious to get up and start doing fun things. And usually those fun things are simply doing nothing but watching the waves breaking. Doing planned “nothing” activities is doing “something” at our age. Yes?

At this point in my life, I am very pleased to find myself waking up and not staring at the inside of a coffin lid. "Another day in paradise...another day above ground". But, sometime it would be nice to wake up and find that it's too late for breakfast!