Dear Night Owl Skeptics,

I am writing this to you from the comfort of my living room, wrapped up in my favorite blanket, sipping on some hot coffee during the time of night that comes right before sunrise. My roommates, friends, family, and the rest of my world have all been asleep for hours now, but I have never felt as alert and awake as I do at this very late time of night.

Now, you have probably heard that when one of your five senses in inhibited, the other four are given the opportunity to heighten their sensitivity, and that is precisely the same phenomenon that occurs within my mind at this time of night. The world around me becomes absolutely still and silent, and since I no longer hear the hustle and bustle of the fast paced surrounding city, I am able to thoroughly hear every single thought whirring around in my head.

It is so much easier to write essays, make academic connections, and even make important self-revelatory decisions when your thoughts are the only things given the opportunity to consume your attention. I am able to become more self-aware nocturnally than I could ever possibly be during a day that brings the car horns, garbage trucks, and chirping birds — an abundance of distractions — that disconnect my focus from my creativity. I am most at peace when darkness falls and I no longer hear anything externally, but am able to hear everything internally.

My normal and preferred schedule of sleeping in and staying up late obviously does not conform to the societal expectation of rising well before noon and sleeping at a relatively decent hour sometime around midnight. For years, I have tried to adjust my sleep schedule to coincide with this agenda, and while I can certainly go about my everyday duties surviving under the constraints of this schedule, I have learned that I simply am unable to truly thrive at the same hours that everyone else does.

True, an early morning start every once in a while can be an empowering experience because I am given more opportunities for social interactions which are limited at night, and I am able to complete any chores or errands that I am unable to do after normal business hours. However, my preferred schedule does not, in any way, advocate neglecting daytime plans and commitments in exchange for a late night rendezvous, and is not in any way associated with the common assumptions of laziness. I still wake up early to attend class, go to work, and take part in any other extracurricular commitments or social plans that I have made, but the state of my consciousness is immensely and permanently clouded in comparison, no matter how early I fell asleep the night before. My creativity and concentration consistently peak at night when time seems to stand still and the sky is indistinguishably stuck in limbo between the sunset and sunrise.

My schedule is often critiqued by people who have close-minded perceptions of productivity and itinerary, yet people already naturally associate night life with adventure and creativity. Many nights people stay up late studying, club hopping downtown, or even simply engulfed in a good movie. People regularly subject themselves to nocturnal endeavors. My way of life should not come as such a shock when the world around us often gets a taste of the same schedule that I abide by, just not to the same extreme. I am sure that sometime in the future I will be expected to wade out of my night owl habits in order to fit the mold of a nine to five work week, but for now, I’ll savor every second in the moonlight.

Sincerely,

An Unapologetic Creature of the Night