Unasleep

As I said in my post “That Bastard Sleep”, I set music as my alarm in college.  The tune was “Bodies” by Drowning Pool.  It was effective and would easily wake me up.  I never drank coffee.  Just getting my butt out of bed was easy.  Other than that brief time in college there was no morning routine.  Just get up and get dressed.  Very concise, very tight, very efficient.  Self-motivation.

I’m 38 now.  I have worked almost constantly since I was 16.  It took me about 11 years to finally get weekends off.  Just ahead of my wedding.  It took me 20 years to get nights off.  For 20 years when I got off work it was always dark, always after 10:30 PM.  Now I’m a 9 to 5 guy.  (actually 8:30 to 5:30).  And now it’s tough to get up.

Before, unless I was dropping off Julian at school, I could just sleep until noon.  Until noon!  Now I gotta get up at like 6:30 AM.  5:40 AM if I want to take a morning walk.  I now require help to get up.  I have an alarm set on my phone.  It’s some default song called “Morning Flower” and it’s pretty terrible.  It doesn’t get my blood pumping.  I must get up to turn that God-awful song off. 

So, I get a shower, get dressed, and drag my four-year-old into the car.  He’s not a morning person, unless it’s the weekend.  On a weekday at this point he’s not awake, he’s unasleep.  But every day on the way to grandma’s and grandpa’s he reminds me, at the same point in the trip, to play his tunes.  I switch the car stereo over to USB and play our songs.  Both by the excellent band Sugar Free Allstars.  

First up we play “Monster Truck” and we both sing.  

And toward the end of the song I exit off the highway onto a large wide turning ramp and Willem shouts, “Hold on tight!” as he sticks his arms in the air and allows the centripetal force to wave his arms to the side.  Following that song, we hit up “Mr. DJ” which is ironically a “sleepy time song”.  A song about a kid trying to avoid bed-time.  And then Willem is ready to face the day.  He’s motivated.  He’s pumped.  He’s up.

I’m not ready yet.  I drive myself the rest of the way to work and pour my first cup of coffee of the day.  I’m getting there.  My routine complete.  Let’s get to work.