10 minutes till reality

This is the writing exercise we did last night at writers group. Describe the first moments of your morning adding more sensory information

Beep beep beep. The insistent alarm drags me from the depths of early morning slumber. I open one eye and the red hot 5:45 glares at me from the milk cartons that serve as my bedside table. I hit the snooze button violently as if it was calling me to my doom not to my morning routine.


As I roll over to the cooler side of the bed the fresh sheets I made the bed with last night rustle like fall leaves indicating a high thread count and 100 % cotton quality that I know must have been a gift. I would never buy sheets this good for myself.


I listen carefully but only hear the thud of the refrigerator in the kitchen below. The children are asleep. When I strain my ears, curving them out my door, across the hall and into the next room I can create an auditory hallucination detailing each breathe of the small lives that are assembled therein.


I flip unconvincingly like a flounder on a hook, testing my pillows for firmness of resolve. They fail, deflating as my head hits dead center. I crumple them under my neck, and now lie prone staring at the ceiling. It's only 5: 50. I have time to burn or in this case smolder.


Above me are the white ceiling tiles; a reverse of the night sky. Pinpricks of black light like so many black holes confront me, uncounted and uncountable no matter how long my lazy morning persists.


There should be news on so I flick the switch to radio on the metallic red faux 50s stereo that rests on the floor by my bed. There is a satisfying click and then a slight hum before voices fill the room with news, sports, and weather. I am really only interested in the weather.


Five more minutes and I am longing for the bitter taste of coffee and decide it is time to plant myself firmly in the day. I sit up and see the green light on the air filter brightly cheering up the room. The air filter does little to fend of the dust of this old house. The filter gives off a consistent mechanical wheezing sound which is far better for it to be making instead of me producing it's human equivalent.


I find my shoes and slip my feet into their cool interiors. Now it's downstairs for coffee. Soon the lives of others will impinge upon mine. First, it's the dog then it's the children but I have wrestled 10 minutes out of the day for myself, in bed with my radio.