There was a time when I would have agreed with her. I had my first brush with the night shift almost 20 years ago, when I graduated from nursing school. I was married with two small sons. Those were the days of eight-hour shifts, 10 shifts per pay period, with new graduates at the bottom of the list for day work.
My husband was not adept at household chores beyond taking out the trash. In the beginning, I routinely arrived home in the morning to a stack of dishes in the sink, unmade beds, laundry and car-pool duty. It didn’t take me long to institute behavior therapy among the males of my household, but even with their help, a mother’s work is never done.
On a typical day I took a three-hour nap in the morning. At noon, I picked up my youngest son from kindergarten, fed him lunch and spent time with him. I eschewed the mantra of the guilty parent: “quality time, not quantity time.” I opted for quantity and resisted hiring a babysitter. I had already missed most of my son’s babyhood while I was in school and didn’t want to miss his childhood. After I picked up my oldest son at 3 p.m., it was time to start dinner and offer help with homework. After dinner, I settled down for another nap before work at 11 p.m.
Six months later, a position opened on the day shift. I escaped the nether world of the night with the zeal of a prisoner just sprung from death row. After that, I pitied night workers for the suffering lot I knew them to be, while fervently thanking heaven I was no longer one of them.
When I rejoined the ranks of the midnight toilers, I was not very enthusiastic. But by then, eight-hour shifts had given way to 12-hour ones. I reasoned that working six nights in a pay period wouldn’t be that bad, especially since my boys were in school full time and quite self-sufficient-even doing their own laundry and dishes. I didn’t think sleeping during the day would be a problem. Unfortunately, I’d forgotten that the real business of the world takes place by the light of the sun, not the moon.
Once again I found that when I wanted to get my car serviced, pay an overdue electric bill, get my hair cut, make the sale at the mall, keep a doctor’s appointment and engage in the myriad activities that constitute life in the not-so-fast lane, I had to interrupt my sleep time to keep up. So I stuck to a day schedule on off hours. As a result, I muddled through my days red eyed and yawning, always 60 seconds behind every conversation and comedian’s punch line, forever shell shocked.
Not long ago, I again contemplated a return to the day shift. I thought it might be nice to fall asleep in the dark of night, wake up early in the morning and get out in the California sun. And then I had an epiphany. Wake up early in the morning? I had always loathed the tyranny of getting up at 5 a.m. Getting up at 5 p.m. was far more pleasant. Get out in the California sun? Not with blue eyes and fair skin. I was a born night person, needlessly exhausting myself by trying to fit into the day world. So I stopped trying.
I gave up keeping a day schedule on my off hours and stuck to my night timetable. My best friend decided I’d gone off the deep end. She insisted I was sleeping my life away. I was uneasy about my plan at first, thinking how hard it would be to accomplish. But remembering what Emerson said, “Discontent is the want of self-reliance,” I determined to become self-reliant and make a normal life as a night person. Who needed the mall when discount stores were open until 10 p.m. and catalogs with 24-hour 800 numbers could deliver anything? This past Christmas, my tree came from the L.L. Bean catalog. Who can be lonely at 2 a.m. when there’s the Internet to surf? And what social activity doesn’t take place after the sun goes down? Who goes dancing at 9 a.m.?
I am still frustrated, however, when I must explain to day workers that, no, an appointment at 10 a.m. isn’t good for me. I’ll be sleeping at that time, I tell them. The response is always the same: first a quizzical look, followed by an offer for an appointment at 11 a.m. When I persist in asking for a late-afternoon appointment, the usual response, delivered in a shocked tone, is, “You mean, you sleep all day?”
Day workers sleep all night, don’t they? Most people understand that certain types of services require around-the-clock personnel to provide them. They just don’t seem to understand what night workers do once the sun comes up. I’m convinced day people think of us as magical beings, like the elves in childhood stories who materialize at sundown and disappear at sunrise. The cobbler must finish the shoes before morning, but alas, he falls asleep. No problem. Kindly elves pop out of nowhere and do it for him. The work gets done, the sun rises and everything is right with the world. Too bad the author of this tale forgot to mention that having worked all night, the elves must sleep all day.
Once I became a dedicated night person, I realized the only real difference between the day world and the night world is the level of light. I recently found a mechanic within walking distance and now the car gets serviced while I sleep. When I wake up, the work is done, just like in the fairy tale. I’ve decided that anything that can’t be accomplished while the sun is on the wane probably isn’t worth doing anyway. But my best friend still insists she’s not giving up on her quest to lure me back to the day shift. I always smile and listen patiently to her rationale but then hold my tongue. I’ve learned to never say never.
