The house is still. All the blinds are closed; only a dim light pokes its nose through the gaps. The Keurig machine clicks on. In a heap on the floor, the blankets in the living room are right where I left them seven hours before. The ceiling pops, but it's only the house shifting, I won't hear the footsteps of my sleeping brother for another hour at least. A garbage truck harrumphs as it plods down the street.

It’s morning. And it's beautiful.

Since the time I outgrew having a parent-determined bedtime, I have been a self-proclaimed night owl. Even when my parents came and turned out my light for me, I loved the nights where I could get away with staying up an extra few minutes or hour to read another couple pages of a book. It was far easier and more enjoyable for me to stay up until 3 am reading, watching a show, finishing up a school project, or even cleaning out my room than waking up anytime before 9 o’clock in the morning.

When I was a teenager, I never thought I would be the kind of person to wake up before my alarm and willingly get out of bed. In fact, getting out of bed was the most revolting part of my day. I hated my alarm. For about a year I had an alarm clock that was a plush monkey that squealed and shrieked when it was time to unfurl myself from my blankets. Its name was Alfred, and the only pleasure I took in owning that monkey was that to turn it off I had to throw it against the ground. If Alfred had been alive, he would have been dead by the end of the year.

But here I am, writing this article at seven in the morning, when I could have slept in until eight. I woke up around 6:20, way before my alarm, and I don’t mind. My body clock has been reset by my summer job, for which I have to get up before six, and now 6:30 feels like sleeping in. My younger self would be so disappointed.

But I'm not.

I can’t call myself a morning person yet; when I wake up my brain is often stuck in a haze that can only be cured through Jesus, coffee, water to the face, and an hour or two of adjustment. I don’t hate the world when I wake up, though. In fact, I am falling more and more in love with early mornings, and here's why:

In the morning I find time to be alone. As an introvert, I need that alone time to recharge and center myself to prepare for a long day full of dealing with people, whether that be co-workers, family, friends or 40 demanding children. I’ve discovered that I feel most ready for the day when I find that solitude in the morning, where my brain doesn’t have to go from zero to overdrive and I have to instantly "people." The quiet is soothing, the stillness refreshing. Maybe a large part of why I am so thankful for the solitude is that there’s no one for me to be grumpy around, and, I think, that's okay.

I feel like my day is more productive the earlier I get started. A day to sleep in is wonderful, but I usually find that a day started late means that everything else in the day gets pushed back, and a morning of comfort can quickly turn into a day of laziness. I have more motivation to be purposeful with my day when I make the effort to get up a little bit earlier. I am perched at the start of the entire day, rather than jumping into the middle of it and eating breakfast at lunch time.

I have time to spend with God. I am getting in the habit of starting my day with prayer and reading God’s Word. I feel more ready to face the day when I have rooted myself in Him, and it's harder to find the motivation to sit and be still when I begin my day day later. I am able to concentrate on His Word and rest in his presence better in that quietness of the morning, without the rush of running late or the bustle of a house already reaching mid-day.

I can develop my own routine. Perhaps mornings have become more doable since my middle school years in large part because of coffee (I didn't start drinking it until college.) There’s no way to tell for sure, but I do know that I love having a hot mug of dark roast in my hands as I adjust to the world of the awake. It's become a part of my routine in the mornings. I like being able to set my own pace and experiment and find what works best for me to begin my day. I haven't quite figured out my exact morning rhythm, but it's been an adventure determining how to not run late in the mornings.

I get to enjoy a part of the day that many people miss out on. I love the smell of a cloudy and chilly morning. I love the fog in the autumn, the flash and crunch of frost on grass before it melts. Can you tell I'm a poet?

As I said before, I’m not fully acclimated to mornings, especially those in which I have to get up before six, but I am finding myself dreading them less and less, and even looking forward to the solitude of the morning. It takes a prayer when it’s five o’clock, a morning-mumble that “This is the day that the Lord has made. I will rejoice and be glad in it.” I like that I have to depend on God's strength rather than my own at the beginning of each day, though.

Mornings are full of grace and possibility. My only wish is that I could be both a morning person and a night owl, but I suppose I should sleep at some point.