Yesterday was a very physically demanding day and I fell into bed due to righteous exhaustion at 7:30. I wake up at 3:30 whether I like it or not, lately, so that seems prudent of my body. I have always been inclined to be awake earlier than the people around me. I don’t really care if my blood type says I am pre-agrarian. Clearly my body thinks I should be up and milking some cows right now. I am adapted to farm life in some interesting ways. And I can’t shake these habits. I’ve never really lived on a farm.

For a while when we I was sixteen we lived on my grandfather’s property. It wasn’t anything close to a farm by the time I lived there. He had been dead for years and the various houses were rented out to lazy people. No one worked the property at all. It just decayed.

I’m out of bed right now even though what I want to be doing in snuggling Noah. He’s not a freak of nature like me. He doesn’t go to bed early enough to be wakened right now. I wasn’t this much of an early riser when I was younger but I’ve always had problems based on the fact that I wake up to early. It’s amazing how many people there are in the world  to get mad at you for stupid things like waking up early in the day.

Tom went between not liking it (while traveling because I am thoroughly obnoxious) and ignoring it. He went to bed late and got up somewhere between ten and noon. He wasn’t going to change his life for me. When you add in his work schedule it very quickly became obvious that once I had a real job (especially teaching, with it’s early-morning schedule) I probably would never see him again. We just didn’t match up. It was a petty reason but on the list of reasons we were Just Not Compatible.

I grew up with my sister loathing me. She is a night owl. She thinks the day should start at 2pm. My mom wasn’t that extreme. My mom was actually remarkably flexible. She could fall asleep whenever (years of pervasive exhaustion teach you this trick) and she was happy to take drugs (usually just caffeine, but harder stuff sometimes) to stay up as long as she wanted.

I’m extremely hostile about caffeine usage. I can tell I’m getting snippy towards Noah about the topic. My mom woke up every morning and took a hand full of pills. Sudafed and Vivarin were always in the mix though it changed up a lot over time depending on time of year and current health issues.

I don’t want to need stimulants to live my life. I want to go to bed when I am tired. I’m not entirely sure why this makes me pathetic but it seems to. I am out of synch. I do not have a “fun” schedule. My schedule seems to be freakishly well suited to my being isolated and alone. This is my chattiest part of the day. I’m in the garage typing because Noah has to sleep. This is when the loneliness gets to me the most.

I wake up in a good mood. I wake up fairly excited about the day. I just do. I always have. And then I have to go spend hours and hours in a room by myself not talking to anyone. For the love of Christ don’t talk to anyone. They need to sleep. Shut up. Don’t you care about anyone but yourself? I do. So I hide. I keep my mouth shut. It’s polite.

I wish I could do things and not feel like I am doing them because I am bad. It is highly inconvenient that my most cheerful part of the day are the three hours before anyone else is awake. If someone woke up with me this would be party time. I have nothing else that needs to be done and I’m quite energetic. Yay! That’s a lot of why running in the morning isn’t that much of a hardship. But I don’t like going in full dark. I’m klutzy and that’s a recipe for injury. My eyes aren’t so hot these days anyway. Dear g-d I need new glasses.

I don’t know if other people have the same experience, but for me getting older is this long surprising journey of finding who I am and what I need. Like the early rising. I’m a lot more at peace with it than I used to be. Now I go to bed at 7:30 instead of trying and trying to stay up later so I can be “cool”. I’m not cool. That’s just life. Oh well. For me to try and stay up in order to be “cool” makes about as much sense as lipstick on a pig. I’m a nasty fucking bitch when I stay up too late. My body doesn’t like it.

It’s hard because that cuts me out of just about every social group I have ever known about. I can’t go dancing. I can’t go to bdsm events. I can’t go hang out with people after fucking dinner. I can’t handle the late-night camping sessions. I’m in bed by 8. I’m exhausted. I am a very physically active person. If you include the silly little walking around during the day ten miles of movement in a day is very common. And I’m carrying a minimum of thirty pounds of weight while I do this movement because I have to get Calli around.

I’m oriented early. I just am. I wish I didn’t feel lame for it. I’m uhm, like Benjamin Franklin? Does that make me seem more virtuous? (He was a cantankerous old lech so maybe I’m on the right track.)

It doesn’t matter. Over the years I will use this time to write a good many books. I think I have a lot in me. Good thing I have thirty + years ahead of me of 3-5 hours of being awake before other people. It will give me a lot of time to get these words out of my head.

Today is Friday. It’s a rest day. I think I will stay home today. I will try not to freak out because I’m sick of the neighbor. I feel bad making my kids play alone. But I’m not happy about the behaviors they are picking up. I have limited ways of influencing this and all of them make me feel guilty. I think it’s time to stop feeling guilty and start feeling ruthless.

I made this chunk of my life about raising my kids. I need to make all forward progress about that. If I don’t like all the results of that forward progress, whatever. I can’t try to take care of everything or I will end up taking care of nothing.