Click on the image for more writing prompts – they are great for those lazy days when the ideas just fail to ring the door bell!

I am a late riser. I sleep like a log all night and the alarm clock goes ignored each morning without fail.  I tried putting it on snooze.  I tried placing it away from the bed so that I have to untangle myself from my covers and thread across the cold tiles to make the banshee cry stop.  I tried setting more than one alarm and have them go off at different times.  All failed.  The only thing that gets me out of bed is the panicked shrill coming from the hallway, “It’s 7.30. Get up already!” and that would be my mother hassling that I’ll be late for work.

Being so late means, naturally, no breakfast.  I wear whatever outfit I would have laid out the previous night – I know myself too well.  I hustle out of the house and into the garage.  I drive on autopilot and somehow arrive at the office.

I grunt my way through the obligatory “good mornings” – I mean grunts. Not a monosyllabic reply but a grunt; noises I make from the back of my throat that allow me to keep my mouth shut and my lips motionless – and finally get to my desk.  There I lay down my bag, switch on the PC and sluggishly make my way to the common room.

I make coffee.

The steam wafts up.  The aroma of the instant black is enough to tickle my nostrils and force my lids open.

Sugar and cream and the magic brew is concocted.

I ingest the medicine.

With every gulp my lids open wider; my mood brightens by a notch; the mushy lumps attached to my shoulders and hips gain strength and become useful limbs again.  I gain arms and legs. My head stops being woozy and my brain starts working. My facial muscles respond to the brain’s  frantic commands to fight gravity and make lips smile. Whole thoughts start to form through the mist in my brain.  Instead of the auto robot I become a walking, thinking human being who can contribute to the world.

So what makes me come alive? It is my first cup of morning coffee.

How about you?