Morning people make the rest of us look bad.

They’re so perky and cheerful and alert. They get to the office early all smiles and good mornings, the rest of us stumble in and can’t even find our desks. Hell, I’m really not awake until early afternoon, when they’re starting to flag. By five o’clock they’re the walking dead and we’re just hitting our stride. We stay late and put in overtime. Where are the early risers? Home, nodding in their La-Z-Boys. Yet they’re the ones who get the ‘atta boys’ and pats on the back. The late nighters who stay and work into the wee hours? We get no recognition, no acknowledgment. Why? Because no one sees us, they’re at home asleep.

What I don’t understand is why getting up early is a virtue, but staying up late is sinful and decadent? And what is it that makes some of us early birds and others of us not? Neurological research suggests it’s a right brain / left brain thing. You buy that? Me, neither.

Years ago I worked with a woman who got up before the sun, did a couple loads of laundry, washed the kitchen floor, and served a full breakfast. Before she showed up for work. There had to be underlying mental health issues there, don’t you think? She also kept large sums of money hidden in her car. Seven or eight hundred dollars, in cash.

I suppose I should have admired her ambition and energy, but I didn’t. What’s to admire about an excess of nervous, hyperactive energy that won’t let you stay still long enough to get a good night’s rest? I’m a heavy sleeper, myself. I’ve slept through two hurricanes. And a break-in. Okay, the break-in turned out to be my mother, but I slept right through it. C’mon, I like to sleep and I’m good at it. That isn’t a sign of weak character.

So to those who would malign us, shame. Night owls aren’t all lazy pub crawlers, we’re fine, hard-working citizens. We just have a very different biorhythm than the bright-eyed and bushy-tailed set. Plus, we don’t think rising with the sun is the only proper and decent way to live. Maybe that was true in the Middle Ages, but it’s a  24/7 world nowadays.

Besides, we like mornings. The pre-dawn hours, anyway.

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