There's a Little Night Owl in All of Us

The night owl in me has been winning way too many nights lately. Once I get writing it seems to take over and I simply have to continue writing...and then re-read and edit, I mean how can you simply leave it there until maybe tomorrow since I know I might lose some great ideas! So most nights I write, and then rehash and rewrite whatever I am pounding out at the moment. By the time I'm done it almost always is around 2:00 a.m. and I need to finish my day! I'm usually off to the kitchen to finally create a lunch for the hubby and do a cursory final clean-up in the kitchen before I head off for the final tasks and and before I head off to the old softy in my life - the pillow on my lovely bed.

The alarm always rings way too soon and sometimes it is more a fuzzy alarm - you know, the kind that is like it's somehwere in another world. My dogs are known to stand by the bed to bother me when it does go off, or at times even jump on the bed to get my attention to remind me that it's time for that once around the yard trip which means they're done for the night.

For those of us who have spouse's who rise early and well before the rest of the working world with that 5:00 a.m. noise in our ears with a reminder that, "you know you should have been to bed so much earlier!" Through all the noise and commotion it takes but a few moments for sleep to finally claim me for those few hours of rest after the quiet in the house is resored once more.

I often get asked, "why are writers middle of the night marauders when getting articles or books done?" when so many can make it a day job and don't seem to be interrupted by those million and one phone calls for doctor's appointments, or other important disruptions that happen during a given day. There is a reason you know...many of us who write have to do so in small homes or apartments and must make do with our kitchen table scribblings, or living room computer visits to get the ideas in our heads and down on the page. Those small interruptions are miserable parts of a life of writing when there is no lovely isolated office somewhere else away from the center of busy family life.

The quiet of the night when most in a house are sleeping can be a very seductive siren's song that can magically give time for the brain to actually formulate thoughts without the constant disruptions that occur daily. For me, the writing nights do mean there is very little sleep while the muse has me - and little done the next day because of exhaustion.

But I wouldn't change my life for a desk job...maybe for a few more hours in the day, though.