I Tried to Become a Morning Person and My Bed Filed a Missing Person Report

Last Tuesday, at approximately 11:47 PM, I made a decision that would change my life forever: I would become a Morning Person. Capital M, capital P. The kind of person who leaps out of bed at dawn, drinks celery juice, journals about gratitude, and probably owns a gong. I announced this to my cat, who blinked slowly in a way that I chose to interpret as support.

The first alarm was set for 5:00 AM. I selected the gentlest sound available, a soft chime called "Sunrise Serenity," because I wanted my transformation to be peaceful. What I did not account for was that at 5:00 AM, no sound on earth is gentle. "Sunrise Serenity" at 5 AM is essentially a foghorn wrapped in a lullaby, and my reaction to it was not serenity. It was the primal panic of a raccoon caught in a dumpster.

I hit snooze. Then I hit snooze again. By the eleventh snooze, my phone had started showing me concerned messages like "Are you okay?" and "This is your fifth alarm, maybe consider a different life path." At 7:43 AM, I rose, defeated, having slept through the exact window in which I was supposed to have written three chapters of a novel and solved climate change.

The Five Stages of Waking Up

I have since identified a grief cycle specific to mornings. Stage one: Denial ("The alarm is wrong, I definitely set it for PM"). Stage two: Anger ("Who invented mornings? I will find them"). Stage three: Bargaining ("If I get up now, I can nap at 10 AM, which is basically the same as getting up at 5"). Stage four: Depression ("I will never be a morning person, I will die as I lived, horizontal"). Stage five: Acceptance, followed immediately by Stage six: Coffee.

The experts say you should put your alarm across the room. I did this. I now have a phone-shaped dent in my wall and a pulled hamstring, because apparently my body's fight-or-flight response to a distant alarm is to lunge like a startled gazelle and then lie on the floor reconsidering all my choices.

Negotiating With the Duvet

My bed, I have realized, is not furniture. It is an entity with opinions. Every morning it makes a compelling case: you are warm, it argues, the world is cold, and also you have nothing important to do until at least 10. I have tried counterarguments. I have tried logic. I have tried reminding it that I have a job and a reputation and a sourdough starter that needs feeding. The bed remains unmoved, literally, because I am still in it.

I have now adopted what I call the Compromise Protocol. I wake up at 5 AM. I do not get out of bed. I lie there, fully awake, thinking about how great it would be to get out of bed. This is technically a win, because I am conscious during the morning hours, and consciousness, I have decided, is the true measure of success.

My cat, who has observed this entire experiment with the detached amusement of a nature documentarian, has started waking me at 4:30 AM by sitting on my face. I believe this is his version of helping. Tomorrow, I am buying blackout curtains, a sunrise alarm clock, and possibly a new personality. I will report back. Probably from bed.