Behind the 8(am) Ball

Almost every day, I am up at 5am, eating, going to the gym, emptying the dishwasher.  "5am?!" I hear from friends and family.  "Why?!"

When I wake up at 5, by the time anyone else is up, I've done a million things.  Nothing fancy, but a million things.

This morning, fighting the cold that seems to have settled in as a houseguest in our apartment, I slept.  And slept some more.  And when I still wasn't feeling better, slept a little more.  By the time I got up, my son and husband were already up, and my day had begun.  Dishes to put away, plans to make, things to clean.  Since we're not doing much of anything today, there's plenty of time to do it all, but somehow, sleeping just a few hours later has made me feel a whole day behind.

Instead of starting my day eating my breakfast by myself (often in the dark, so that no one even thinks to get up), I am eating it while supervising my son making his breakfast.  Instead of laying out the day's arrangements for my half-asleep husband, I am sleepily waving goodbye as he heads off to work.  Instead of loading breakfast dishes into an already-emptied dishwasher, I am stacking them in the sink until I can get around to the unloading. 

Before I know it, it's 5pm, and what have I accomplished?  One of the best things about rising early is knowing from the get-go that you will have something to show for your day.  While the extra hours of sleep may have helped my cold (or NOT!), they have left me behind the 8 ball all day--chasing the messes instead of anticipating them.

I don't think ANYONE wants to set an alarm on the weekend, but I think I will for tomorrow.  A cold is a cold, but there's just too much to do to be behind the 8(am) ball more than once!