Oh what a beautiful morning

I love early mornings. I love the look of the pale sunshine streaking over the now-golden grass. I love the birds singing and the fresh look of everything outlined against the new sky. I love the idea much more than the reality. I am really not a morning person. I have a body clock is attuned to getting things done at night. Well, at least I did before I had children. Now I think that there’s not really any time that I’m at my best and brightest. My father blames it on “rusticating” in the country. I think that playing family grand marshal is probably more to blame.

I’ve always imagined that so-called “morning people” are the real movers and shakers in the world. You know them -- those people who leap out of bed shiny-eyed and enthusiastic and complete a day’s work before the rest of us turn off our alarms and turn over for a few more minutes. Occasionally I’ve speculated on what I might have achieved had I been one of these mythic beings. One reads about them in the newspaper, CEO of this or that, international athlete, all-round good person who not only gets up early, but usually only needs four to six hours of sleep a night.

Today is day one of my attempt to reset my body clock or at least to try to squeeze a few more things into my day. Instead of gratefully burrowing back into my pillow when Mr. Blithe’s alarm clock went off at a disgustingly early hour, I staggered out of bed, found my way to the kettle and managed (I think) to not disrupt his “getting out of the house in time to catch the bus” routine too much. I then sat down and worked on my book for 45 minutes before having to wake, feed and harass the children schoolwards.

45 minutes doesn’t sound like a lot of time, but if I can manage to do it every day then I might finally make some progress. Life has been really frantic recently. I find myself at the end of the day breathless and running over in my mind the things I have yet to complete. I was even cranky over the weekend because the winter darkness fell before I was finished with what I wanted to do. When you find yourself frustrated with nature, that is when you need to take action.

I’ll have to see how adding some time to the beginning of my day works. If I get even more disorganised and bad-tempered, it might not be worth it. But if the satisfaction of achievement outweighs the rest, it might be.