Early Birds Versus Night Owls
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‘Tis the Season to Feel Inadequate, Holidays, Special Occasions and Other Times Our Celebrations Get Out of Hand by Dorothy Rosby, coming in November.
Some people are morning people. Some people are night people. And some people are only people for a few minutes right around suppertime. I happen to be a morning person, though I do cheer up considerably at the thought of supper.
Unfortunately, families and workplaces are made up of all types, and this inevitably leads to conflict.
A night person told me his early bird wife had, on more than one occasion, attempted to make their bed while he was still in it. Even I think that’s inconsiderate. She should at least tell him to get his lazy bones out of bed first.
Night people love to stay out on New Year’s Eve. Morning people prefer to be up early on New Years Day. You can see how this could cause tension in a relationship. If a morning person sees the New Year in at all, it’s because we woke up at midnight to use the bathroom.
Morning people think more clearly in the morning. Anyone who knows me will tell you it’s true; I don’t think very clearly at all in the afternoon and evening. But that’s just when the night people I know start making sense—to each other.
We all started out the same. As infants, we woke up at all hours of the night—and saw to it that our parents did too. Eventually we slept through the night and started waking up early in the morning, especially on weekends. Then we became teenagers, and as you know, there is no such thing as a teenage morning person. Their biology would have them going to bed after 1 a.m. and not up until the lunch dishes are washed and put away, and not just because they don’t want to do the dishes.
Night people don’t progress beyond this point. But morning people continue to evolve. That doesn’t make us better people—well some of us are better people. But mostly what it makes us is tired. As the years go by, what we call morning continues to retreat into night. Eventually, we’re getting up about the same time the night owls are going to bed.
When I was a teenager, one of my first jobs required me to serve breakfast to morning people who, at that point in my life, seemed far more enthusiastic than the time of day called for. I can’t remember what time I had to be at work, and it doesn’t matter. Back then, I thought anything before 8 a.m. was still night.
My father, the early bird, woke me up for work. He was always up by 4 a.m., and he was not sympathetic about my need for sleep; witness the fact that he routinely rototilled the garden at sunrise.
All these years later, I’m the one who’s up at 4 a.m.—not rototilling, but contemplating. That’s more considerate of the night people in the house. It’s also easier. And what I’m contemplating today is how night owls and early birds can live together. For starters, we probably shouldn’t rototill at 4 a.m.—or 11 p.m. But we should also look for the value in each other. If there were no morning people, who would make the coffee? If there were no night people, who would watch the infomercials?
And we must stop thinking we’re superior because of our sleep habits. You know what I’m talking about. Night people, can be a little smug, thinking us morning people are old fuddy-duds who sleep through the action.
But morning people can be a self-righteous bunch too. You’ve heard that rot about “Early to bed and early to rise makes a man healthy, wealthy, and wise.” Only a morning person would say that, and even they know it’s not necessarily true. As a morning person, I may be healthy, but I’m not particularly wealthy. And if I’m wise, it’s only for a few hours in the morning.
