The Magic of Sleeping In
Why I’m never making another resolution to wake up at 5 am.
It seems like everywhere I look, especially this time of year, I see someone trying to convince me that waking up early is some kind of magic cure for everything from inertia to, oh, I don’t know, Global Warming?
There’s even a whole trendy, bestselling book on the subject.
I’ve personally had “wake up at 5 a.m. every morning” on my New Year’s Resolution list many times over the years.
But, ever since my move from Nevada to Pennsylvania in November, I’ve been doing something that really has been life changing.
After a lifetime of waking up with the sun (or before), even when I didn’t absolutely have to, I’ve been sleeping in.
I think it’s a combination of things that’s led to this phenomena.
I’m a desert girl who has moved to the land of constant overcast. Everyone thought it was hilarious to tell me how cold I was going to be and tease me about drowning in lake effect snow. No one bothered to let me know that in the winter (I really hope it’s only in the winter), Northwestern PA is covered with a pot lid of deep overcast. It’s not even clouds. Just a layer of gauze that blocks the sun.
Without the sun, my body seems to think there’s no reason to wake up.
Also, we moved to a house that’s a five minute walk from my daughter’s middle school. For the first time in two decades, I don’t have to drive anyone to school in the morning. And she’s fourteen, which means she’s old enough to pour her own Cheerios and brush her own hair.
I wake up long enough to make sure she’s awake, and then she gets herself ready and out the door without me.
It isn’t always fun when your youngest baby gets old enough to not need you anymore, but in this case it means that I don’t have to get out of bed at 6 a.m. Or 5 a .m. if I’m on a ‘wake up an hour before your kids’ kick.
I have an Echo Dot in my bedroom. She has one in hers. I tell Alexa to “drop in on Ruby” and she opens a . . . I don’t know, it feels like some kind of magical portal directly into my kid’s bedroom. I can make sure…
