Morning People

I am a morning person and wouldn't have it any other way. If you are night person, stay right where you are. I, and my morning person brethren, don't want you infiltrating our world. We have a great thing going and we don't want you people interfering.

Night people get all the publicity. According to cultural mythology, they are either cool-sexy-artistic types who argue about postmodern anti-irony well into the night, or cool-sexy-party types who drink designer martinis and dance in soap suds falling from the ceiling. Their membership boasts the likes of Andy Warhol, Missy Elliott and Lenny Kravitz, while morning people are lumped in with Katie Couric and Ned Flanders.

The entertainment industry — arbiter of alleged cool — has squarely sided with night people. It has given them Comedy Central's "The Daily Show," while we get "Morning Edition" on NPR. There is no "Wild On Breakfast" on the E! channel. On the East Coast, the last half of Monday Night Football and every game of the World Series is available only to late-niters. If someone told me there is another Hank Williams, Jr. song at the end of a Monday Night Football game, I'd have no choice but to believe them.

In music and film, night-time is preeminent. Billy Joel sings of crashing a party on Friday night and calling to say he was sorry on Saturday. The train to Georgia and out of Gladys Knight's heart left at midnight. (Don't go, Gladys — he's a night person!) At night you can Boogie with Dirk Diggler, get Saturday Fever, or run from the Living Dead. The morning is just not Hollywood enough for Hollywood. Yes, there was "Good Morning, Vietnam," but as you may recall, Cronauer had to be roused from bed and carted to the studio for his debut broadcast because he'd been out partying the night before.

Cultural mythology, however, has it all wrong. The quiet, early morning with the sun low in the trees is the definition of peace. Every sound is muffled, all movement is lazy and there are no sharp edges. Nothing has gone wrong yet in the day; there is only optimism and opportunity.

Being out-and-about early in the morning is as great a joy as quietly sipping coffee on the sofa. It's a different world, a comfortable world. Go to any grocery store at 7:00 a.m. on a Saturday morning and you'll see what I mean. Voices are gravelly; everyone has an easy smile and a soft "good morning." We move at about 70 percent of afternoon speed. There is no bustle. There is no hustle. We don't sigh dramatically or jangle our keys impatiently while standing in line to check out; the speakers don't squawk with price checks and clean-ups on Aisle 9. Sometimes the shelves are still being stocked and boxes are stacked in the aisles, but we don't mind. We dress for comfort and no judgments are made. We haven't all showered and we're in baseball caps and soft cotton. Our sweatpants and sweatshirts were not sold as an outfit, and our shoes have rubber soles.

Morning people don't proselytize much because we don't want you night people infringing on our world. Every now and then one of you violates our morning. You don't understand the code, you snap us out of our routine, forcing the late morning on us before we are ready, stealing something important from us. You talk too loudly, move too quickly. You are frustrated by the pace of things and when you screw up our rhythm, we want to hurt you. But we don't, because we are morning people and much too civilized.

The truth of the matter is that we are better than you. Maybe that seems extreme, but by my groundless — and possibly unfair — assessment, Uday Hussein, Paris Hilton and Liza Minelli are all night people. Whereas, you can be sure Sarah McLachlan, Tiger Woods and Christiane Amanpour are morning people.

Subconsciously, you night people know we are better. That's why you always try and involve us in your nightscapades. You invite us to any and every event; you beg us to come. And sometimes, when moved to do so, we join you; we are able to reach a balance. But you'll notice we never invite you to an early morning coffee or workout. Why? Because you don't belong, because you'll ruin everything and we'd be stared down like traitors by our early morning compatriots.

So you night people stay where you belong and we'll stay where we belong. That way we can live in peace and not have to go to war. And that is a war you would lose, by the way. You'd learn all about it on the five o'clock news.

— Patrick Quirk (pquirk@gmail.com)

— graphic by Alison Paddock (arpdesigns@hotmail.com)