Last week I started an early morning yoga class. Twice a week at 6am I get to drag my sorry self out of my snug, warm bed and drive through the rain (because you KNOW it’ll be raining) in order to spend 90 minutes stretching, balancing, and contorting my body into unnatural positions.
When I signed up, I thought it sounded like What a great way to start the day. Now I’m more in the space of WHAT WAS I THINKING?!
Day one I was up and at ‘em bright and early. I left the class feeling tired but stretchy… in a good way.
Fast forward to the night before Day 2 of class.
9:43pm I remind Jay of my early-AM commitment. We talk about how the morning will go and climb into bed.
10:00pm I’m feeling rather smug to be in bed with lights out so early… this must surely be a record for me. I am SO responsible.
10:05pm I snuggle in, enjoying the coziness of my new-and-overpriced-but-its-Pottery-Barn-so-it-must-be-worth-it quilt.
10:06pm I turn onto my stomach.
10:09pm I turn onto my side.
10:12pm I stretch.
10:15pm I scratch my right knee.
10:20pm I kick off the getting-too-warm-to-be-comfortable quilt and roll onto my back.
Thoughts raced through my head at a hundred miles an hour. If I could somehow harness HALF the thoughts that come into my head when I’m trying to go to sleep I’d surely do something amazing. Invent a time machine. Cure disease. Write the next Gone With the Wind. Something!
Unfortunately for humanity the thoughts are as fleeting as they are numerous… just there long enough to get me good and awake and then… gone.
11:02pm I take my head full of thoughts to the kitchen to get a glass of water. While I’m here, I’ll just quickly check my email, I think. And I do.
11:20pm Might as well also check my blog.
11:30pm …reading blogs…
12:52am I wonder what’s going on in the news?
1:45am Back in bed.
2:00am I lie in bed restless, gazing at the ceiling and WILLING myself to go to sleep. It seems my will isn’t as strong as I thought.
I don’t know when I finally drifted off but it was significantly later than the 10:00pm time when I started.
5:45am BEEP BEEP BEEPBEEPBEEP my alarm erupts in a cacophony of metallic beeping and I shut it off. Promptly and with conviction.
8:15am I stumble out of bed and into the kitchen. Jay is wearing an enormous grin. Uh oh.
He stretches one arm over his head, the other across his eyes, and pretends to snore.
“What do the yoga people call this pose?” he asks, rather gleefully.
I snort something unintelligible and pour myself some coffee while rubbing my eyes.
I’ll tell you what I call that pose…
Wake-me-up-and-I’ll-punch-you. Mama’s sleeping.
That’s right.
***
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xo Jen
October 9, 2007 at 12:21 pm
Of course the quilt is worth it! (that’s what I’m currently saying to my husband about the one I have my eye on!)
Sorry it didn’t work out for you this morning – insomnia sucks.
October 9, 2007 at 12:29 pm
Good for you getting up that early!
October 9, 2007 at 12:41 pm
I think I like that pose.
October 9, 2007 at 12:51 pm
Ironically, I bet it was the yoga that made you that more awake…stupid irony.
October 9, 2007 at 12:56 pm
Whatevah will you do when CJ is in school that STARTS at 8:15 am? hehe!
October 9, 2007 at 1:02 pm
I would have a notebook handy. For kicking ass and subsequent name-taking.
October 9, 2007 at 1:10 pm
Wake-me-up-and-I’ll-punch-you. Mama’s sleeping. *SNORT*
I don’t know HOW you do it.
October 9, 2007 at 1:33 pm
the thought was there…that totally counts.
October 9, 2007 at 1:51 pm
Oh, I know that pose and am totally amazed that we scratched our knee…at…the…same…exact…time!
October 9, 2007 at 1:52 pm
I can just see the look on his face… my hubby has the same one when I get all gung ho about something and forget about it a day or two later, which happens, um, a lot!
Too funny… great post! ;-)
October 9, 2007 at 2:28 pm
That’s one of my favorite poses. Hubs knows it well.
October 9, 2007 at 2:39 pm
I’ve had to learn over the years that making a commitment before 8 am is just not supposed to happen with me. While I admire the early risers I am, and forever will be a night owl. You can’t fight something like this.
October 9, 2007 at 3:05 pm
I hit the snooze button this morning and I must’ve turned the radio down as well, because I overslept today. Me bad.
At least your yoga class was a good thought. lol
October 9, 2007 at 3:46 pm
That is how I felt taking my 7am chem class this summer. I did not have the option of sleeping in. Miss a summer school class and you are out of 3 days worth of regular quarter info. Not wise in chem.
I can relate though. I am a late to bed, late to rise person.
October 9, 2007 at 3:59 pm
I can relate to both the pose and the energetic thoughts at night!!
LOL….you’ll make the next one. I’d have posed a finger as well!!
October 9, 2007 at 4:26 pm
Ugh. I used to get up at 4:20 to get to the gym by 5am four mornings a week. I was on auto pilot and so exhausted anyway, I slept like a ton of bricks. I feel for yah!
October 9, 2007 at 4:35 pm
In the days before husbands and babies, I used to get up at 5:30 5 mornings a week, work out for an hour, then get ready for school, go to my classes at the university, go home, and study until 10ish. Man, that’s some crazy shit.
October 9, 2007 at 6:03 pm
I have long since given up on the idea that I might get up early enough to work out. The only way I was ever able to get up to go running was when there was a Drill Sergeant screaming in my face.
October 9, 2007 at 6:05 pm
Yoga is such a great idea in theory. At least it seemed like it when I recently signed up for a prenatal yoga class.
The last thing I want to do is stretch or exercise when I’m still feeling nauseous ALL the time. So before I even started I’m now a yoga dropout. Oh well.
October 9, 2007 at 7:44 pm
I’ve had many a night like that.
If only we could do yoga right before bedtime, that’d be the best — I am so relaxed and sleepy when class is over!
October 9, 2007 at 7:45 pm
I tried yoga once. It was the one time I felt LEAST relaxed while exercising. Go figure!
Jane, Pinks & Blues
October 9, 2007 at 8:18 pm
I wish I had the nerve to go to a Yoga class….I’ve tried it at home, and I liked it….but I feel too uncomfortable exercising in public…I’m a weirdo!
Insomnia sucks! I’ve had it all my life, and I went through a really bad phase a before I got pregnant with Zander. I didn’t sleep for 3 days…no exageration! I would go to bed around 11pm, and just lie there…for hours….finally, when it started to get light out I would just get up and head to work early….like 5:30-6am! That went on for three straight days! When I finally crashed, it was like I was in a mini-coma! Nasty!
I always have way to much crap flying around in my head at night. It usually takes me about an hour to fall asleep! Hope this was a one-time thing for you!
October 10, 2007 at 6:10 am
I have something for you on my blog. :)
October 10, 2007 at 6:11 am
Haha! This reminds me of the time I signed up for Boot Camp at the Y. 90 minutes every other morning at 5:45. Hee hee. I actually loved it once I got there, but getting there was a big problem. I’m SO not a morning person.
October 10, 2007 at 8:06 am
Husbands, I tell ya!Well, you did better than I probably would have done, at least yuo made to your first session. :D
October 10, 2007 at 10:36 am
Hahaha! Well, at least you got farther than I would… I could NEVER see myself signing up for anything that early in the morning.
Heck, I have a hard enough time getting up at the normal time for work, never mind adding something so foolish as exercise to my AM agenda.
October 10, 2007 at 11:55 am
I’m focusing a little too much on your quilt. I want to see it. I have such a love/hate thing going with Pottery Barn. Expensive whore that she is, I love her stuff.
I loved this post! We all need to keep micro-recorders at our bedside for those mind-racing times.
October 10, 2007 at 1:58 pm
THIS is why I signed up for 9am yoga once a week, much more civilized.
With age comes wisdom (about yourself anyway). I know I would NEVER make that 6am class! :D
October 10, 2007 at 3:06 pm
Oh girl! Yoga will be addictive for you I am sure. I recently started YOGA too and I LOVE IT!! It all depends on the teacaher though, so I hope you have ag ood one… one getting up at the crack of dawn and driving in the dark and rain for! Have fun!
October 10, 2007 at 5:56 pm
Great post! Reminds me so much of… ME!!
October 10, 2007 at 7:02 pm
I have had so many nights like those. It is terrible, wide awake and I want to keep going even though I know I will pay for it the next day.
Even so, there is no way in H-E double hockey sticks that I would be waking up that early to wrap myself like a pretzel. Hope it gets better for ya.
October 10, 2007 at 7:57 pm
Um yeah. I’m so not a morning person because most of the times I have nights just like that.
But you might be able to inspire me. Keep me posted on the progress, huh?
October 10, 2007 at 10:22 pm
Eugh, I’m looking at the Y’s schedule and 5:45 AM Yoga does not appeal to me. Not that that part of the day is not already scheduled for me anyway.
October 11, 2007 at 9:00 am
Too funny! I totally agree about being able to harness those late night thoughts and turn them into something great! I’m almost always up half the night and can NOT stop my brain from running about.
October 11, 2007 at 11:12 am
I hate mornings, as much as the next person. I’m a true night owl, up most nights until 12:30 or later. However, as much as I would like to continue that “yoga pose” in the morning. The three kids I must get off to school and my job that requires me to leave the house most mornings by 7:30 doesn’t allow.
Excuse me while I go dream of the days when I will be able to blissfully aquire that “morning yoga pose”.
October 11, 2007 at 11:23 am
Hahaha, what a fitting name for such a pose! I can only do 6 AM yoga during vacation breaks because I’ll need to take a nap later or sleep in the next day, haha.
October 17, 2007 at 3:47 pm
I admire your willingness to plan for a 6am yoga class. I couldn’t do it. Instead, I work out at the end of the day. I am SO not a morning person.