I am not a morning person. Anyone who has lived with me for a long enough period of time to see me get up in the morning more than -say- two or three mornings in a row will know that I am NOT a morning person.

I LIKE mornings. I like fresh air and quiet and sunrises and little morning birdies beebling around. I even like getting up in the morning to exercise. A brisk walk before everyone else is up is one of my favorite things.

But I am not a morning person. I’m a slow starter, I’m thick headed and maladroit. Most of the time I can manage to actually walk without bumping into things…. not all the time, but most of the time.
And my brain doesn’t kick in for at least an hour after I’ve gotten up. It’s a good thing my car is sensible and has a good sense of direction because I’m not sure how I’d get back and forth to work otherwise.

I am, and always have been, confusing to Andrew’s family. Although after long acquaintance they do understand that expecting me to be vivacious first thing in the morning is a lost cause. Hell, most mornings I’m barely coherent.

It’s worse during the dark period of the year. I’m a hibernator. When it’s dark out my brain understands that it could still be daytime, but my body says: “Dark. Dark equals night time, night time equals sleep. Good night!” It’s a lost cause on winter mornings.

I work the early (0700-1700) shift at work during the even numbered months of the year. In the last few weeks and during the days I worked in October and December of last year, my mornings follow a veryset routine.
I get up, do my bike ride, feed cats, make breakfast, pack my lunch, shower, and dress. Most mornings I barely turn on a light. I do have to turn on a light in the kitchen (the night light over the stove hood) and in the bathroom when I shower, but for the rest of it…. candle light or dark (come on, in a suburban house, especially one that’s crawling with electronics, it’s never really dark anyway. Why should I waste the energy?)
Sometimes Andrew doesn’t even notice me leaving. And pretty much always the cats will eat their breakfast and then go bumbling back to whatever soft place they’d been snoozing before breakfast and go back to sleep.

Why am I telling you this?

The Northwest Flower and Garden Show opened this morning. Andrew had pulled the first shift at the Fungi Perfecti booth and he needed to be at the convention center downtown as early as possible. Because we have easy access to the YAY! Train! and because driving, let alone parking, downtown is always a nightmare, Andrew was planning to take the train. So he needed to get up early so he could get the train into downtown.
So I got him up when I got up at a little after 5 a.m. My body automatically fell into it’s morning motions while my brain huddled at the back of my head protesting that it wasn’t really morning. Andrew came out of the bedroom to see me in my jammies crouched over my bowl of oatmeal in the dimly lighted dining room staring blankly at the wall in front of me.
Andrew thought it was funny (why is it that morning people always think that non-morning people are funny?), but I’ve known for a long time that he’s a morning person. And since he couldn’t manage to get himself going without just a little light, he turned on a few so he could see and neither burn himself nor get himself caught in the coffee grinder.

The light didn’t do anything at all in terms of waking me up, but to Pogo it was clear evidence that IT WAS MORNING!
Flitter, sensible little creature that she is, blinked, mumbled, and went staggering back to her nice warm soft spot. Pogo is obviously of the Hobbes school of “YAY! IT’S MORNING! NOW WE CAN PLAY AGAIN!” and tried to mug her. When that failed he turned his attention to me.

I am not a morning person.
But my cat is.

I think I’ll keep the lights off in the mornings. Pogo is obviously light activated.