One of my pet peeves is anything that puts me off schedule in the morning. And I mean anything. I have a specific routine in the mornings, every morning. I get up at 4:45am, get dressed, brush my teeth and hair, go upstairs and start the car as I load my school and gym materials inside, go back inside and grab my lunch and head back out to the car.
My morning timing runs down to the minute. I know at exactly which time, 5:13a.m., that I need to be sitting in my car with everything I need in order for me to get to the gym at exactly 5:30a.m. I even know the different locations that I need to be in at 5:17a.m., 5:21a.m. and 5:27a.m. to know with certainty that I am on the correct pace. I run on minutes. Due to this type of rigid morning schedule, however, nothing can get in the way or it feels like the world is crashing down on me.
    I might open my garage to see that my car is covered in snow. I will have to scrape it off. This will take at least three minutes. I am now behind.
    I might encounter a slow driver. Why doesn’t everyone drive like they have somewhere to be? I am now two minutes off my pace and I cannot speed. I am now behind.
    I might be stopped at the longest stoplight in the entire universe. I am stopped for two minutes. I am now behind.
    All of these little things make my blood feel as though it is boiling under my skin. My schedule is important to my character and I carefully plan it out for each morning. I pack my clothes, food and shoes the night before. I do so much, and for what? There will always be something that gets in my way.
    However, I have found a particularly simple way of avoiding the blood boiling feeling that occurs when something creates an issue with my schedule. I have found that waking up five to ten minutes earlier can account for almost ALL of the minutes that may be lost by some driving grandpa, a decade long stoplight or five inches of snow. This is how I have resolved my conflict and I have to say it feels freeing to be able to get through a morning without the sense of hysteria when something, whatever it may be, creates a momentary halt in my morning routine.
   Notice that word “almost” that was inserted right before the “ALL”? Well, there are still times where those five to ten minutes do not make up for time lost by prehistoric drivers and all of the other time wasting situations mentioned above. Those times, I can truly say, are character defining moments when my head doesn’t burst. I just have to think, it’s only a minute.