Waking up is hard to do
Sometimes when I check on Ethan while he's sleeping, I'll find him curled into himself in a far corner of the mattress, as though the crib has a spin cycle that's continuously flinging him outward. Other times, I'll find him half-sitting, hunched over a stuffed toy or a bundle of blanket, as though a narcoleptic spell hit him in the middle of packing for his departure from the crib.
Around 7:30 every morning, Ethan starts to chirp, my tiny little warm-blooded alarm clock. Of course he's much more pleasant to wake up to than a screeching electronic beep (or anyone on the radio, for that matter), so my daily objections to the universe about, you know, having to get out of bed and live my life, have been slightly tempered. Slightly. Sleeping is my addiction, and for the past year I've been going through detox.
It wasn't always like this. I remember when my cousin Susanne came to live with us in California for a few months when she was 18, I sometimes tried my darndest to sleep as long as she did, like a cool teenager you see. And Susanne was really cool--she wore brand-new high-tops and a jean jacket with a brooch that looked like a huge diamond ring on it. She's still cool, and probably in part because she stopped wearing high-tops when they went out of fashion. But Susanne would sleep late, sometimes until TEN A.M. and I just couldn't stay in bed that long.
Come to think of it, although I've woken up every single day of my life (which, by doing some fast math, is.....A LOT of times) I don't remember very many instances of waking up as a kid. What time would I usually wake up? Would I come stumbling out of my room silently, or was I chipper? I know for sure that as a teenager I was the opposite of chipper. Let's just leave it at that. These days, I can be quite chipper as long as I get to pick what time I get out of bed. So, rarely.
But this much I know: As soon as Ethan graduates to a toddler bed, I'm teaching him how to use the dvd player and not bother mommy before 9 a.m.