In bed by midnight, or eleven even, up at seven or eight. I suspect that my parents still don't understand how wrong my recent sleep schedule has seemed to me. Better to get accustomed to the working world's schedule, and have the time to begin my day leisurely.

And really, I can't explain why I would continue to keep a schedule that I adapted myself to primarily because of the time it gave me, quiet time to read and write while everyone else was sleeping. Also: vampire movies.

Of all the roommates I've had over the years (seven, if I'm counting right), only Jonas could stay up later with any regularity. It's a running joke at my house that my dad and I are sometimes only an hour or two away from greeting each other in the morning right before I go to bed.

I used to be a morning person. I remember getting up early enough on a few occasions to see a test pattern; I think they've stopped using them now. At least, I've come to that same time from the other direction and never seen one.

Once, or perhaps I only dreamed the memory of watching television in our porch, there was some kind of farm report: cows. Strange how so many of my old memories are just out-of-focus snapshots.

When did the transformation start, when did I realize that I could cultivate "insomnia," as I called it then? Looking back, the process was so gradual that I don't think I noticed it until my family started commenting on it.

The distractions are gone now. I can't even hear my neighbors, for the most part, and my schedule would work whether I woke up at 8 or 11. Eight would let me take on more hours at the school.

I stayed up until three last night reading Lucifer, a nook in the Sandman universe I've only recently discovered. A few nights before I was in bed by eleven; my dreams included an original episode of King of the Hill.

Spring break messed up my sleep pattern, and, inexplicably, I have to make the choice again: do I want to be a morning person, or a night person? I guess I always could have taken three or four days and re-adjusted, but now the issue has been forced. I find myself staying up later and later again.