The world is suddenly a better place for night owls

I don’t know what you were doing between 1 a.m. and 3:30 a.m. last night, but it was probably less than I accomplished.

I did some writing till 1:15 a.m., then caught part of a U.S. Open tennis match I’d recorded — then I finished up a mystery novel. Eventually, at 2:50 a.m. I switched over to my “heavy lumber” pre-sleep library to unwind with the book:

Quantum Theory Made Easy: Concepts and Applications-z-z-z-z.

I’m a lifetime night owl who has always been chirpier at two in the morning than seven. I’m forever marching to a different drum than those around me — in fact, I have friends who wake up at 4:30, not long after I fall asleep.

Those who know me don’t phone before 10 a.m. because I sound as alert, sharp and engaging as they do at 3 a.m.

I know many early birds hop out of bed raring to fly, but I’m a slow, groggy riser. That’s why I avoid media interviews, breakfast meetings, public talks or conversations with anything but my cereal bowl before 11 a.m.

For most of my life, owls like me were practically outlaws, as society ran strictly on an early morning bugle call.

All kids were frogmarched to school comatose at dawn, while the rest of us heard bromides about “rise and shine” bringing “morning glory” — or how “the early birds always get the worm.”

Let them have it. I’ve always preferred a cappuccino at 11.

In truth, I was an early bird at becoming a night owl. From Grade 1 on, I spent mornings in class looking glassy-eyed, though I was actually biologically asleep. When I finally did become alert at 1 p.m., school was almost over.

My first reporting job at the old Montreal Star demanded I occupy my desk at 8 a.m. like a lifeless store mannequin — then leave at 4 p.m. just when my brain was warming up.

But nothing ever changed my natural rhythm. I become productive around noon and can work cheerfully past 2 a.m. — as long as I sleep in.

In fact, I often get a second wind around midnight. I love the silence after 1 a.m. when I can read, write and think best — and if I want company, I just call West Coast friends, the only people I know anymore who are still up.

I probably became a writer so I could choose my own hours. But data about common night owl jobs shows I could also have been a highly successful restaurant cashier, security guard or night janitor.

I come by my hours naturally, as both my parents were night birds and family mornings were a silent time, disturbed only by the gurgle of coffee and rustle of newspapers. My brother, a musician, goes to bed even later than I.

There are many famous night owls I admire including Winston Churchill, Bob Dylan, Marcel Proust, Franz Kafka, Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec and former president Barack Obama. But our ranks also include Josef Stalin and Mao Zedong, so we owls do have our dark side.

For centuries we late-risers were seen as criminals of the clock, while early morning “larks” were on God’s timetable. But in recent years, we’re being rehabilitated.

At least seven people forwarded me a New York Times piece last week trumpeting the virtues of night owls. A recent book, Why We Sleep, says a full 30 per cent of us are night owls — not by choice but by our DNA and “genetic fate.”

Life is getting better for us owls, too, after centuries of early morning mourning. Most hotels no longer cut off breakfast at 9 a.m., but serve till 10:30 or even 11.

Hundreds of enlightened schools now start anywhere from 8:55 a.m. or 9:30 to as late as 10:45 in Australia. Studies show their students get better grades

Today you can buy everything from socks to stocks at 3 a.m. and probably arrange a 4 a.m. bank loan to cover it.

in first-period classes, because they are actually awake.

The world is now filled with round-the-clock restaurants, pharmacies, banks, gas stations, laundromats and “Anytime Fitness” gyms. There are thousands of 24/7 TV networks and an online world that never sleeps, so we owls can be as busy as larks.

Today you can buy everything from socks to stocks at 3 a.m. and probably arrange a 4 a.m. bank loan to cover it.

Even the usual 9-to-5 work sked is becoming uncool in Silicon Valley, where late night coders, hackers and other IT night-shifters rule — then set their alarms for noon.

It’s about time. As I see it, sunrise was probably a great time to get up and go hunting for breakfast before they invented the supermarket. But dawn serves little essential purpose today for anyone but farmers, fishermen, bird-watchers, joggers and other extremists.

So perk up and hoot my fellow owls: the day may yet belong to us night people, too. I can hardly wait for new songs and sayings celebrating our nocturnal advantages, like:

Wake at noon, work late nights, And you can beat the traffic lights.