{ rude awakening }

5:00am: first alarm. swiped left to snooze.
5:30am: snoozed alarm. reset to 5:45am.
5:45am: second alarm. swiped right to dismiss.
5:47am: upright, moving toward shower.

i shower in complete darkness whenever possible. in general, i prefer the lowest light available. there are rarely full lights or lamps on if i have my choice. candace taught me four years ago that introversion (sp - intraversion?) can often be characterized by a sensitivity to stimulus in general, not just the over-simplified social sensitivity that's crudely plastered everywhere. this is definitely true of me with light. (i'm sensitive to ongoing background noise as well - sitting at the center of an office without the luxury of walls or a door to close leaves me exhausted by the end of the day. i'm not a person who needs tv or music on to feel comfortable - i often drive in complete silence, no radio. the exceptions are dancing at a club or concerts or fireworks. in these situations i welcome being overwhelmed aurally because there are so few times i'm able to be completely in the present moment, and the lights and sound hold me there.)

that parentheses was longer than the un-parenthesized part of the paragraph. oops.

//

at 6:34am i stopped and shook my head at the ridiculousness of having just probably woken my neighbor with the sound of my blender. i put all the dry ingredients for my smoothie in the blender last night to save time this morning. not sure if it helped. (if i moved faster in the morning, maybe it would've helped.)

//

last week i shared a hotel room with a co-worker who (no joke) BANGED on the bathroom door at 6am and when i emerged, MARCHED toward me with arms pumping, DOO-DOO-ing some version of reveille. it felt like an assault. i put both hands up, closed my eyes, and backed away. "that's going to have to stop, right now," i growled.

i am not a morning person.