Wake up Little Suzi

Not so long ago the entire family was dining together, and the discussion turned to the inability of my wife and daughter to get up without hitting snooze repeatedly. I remembered that the oldest boy once had a Nickelodeon alarm that played the Nick theme song (from the 90's) and then launched into an alarm blare like a battleship klaxon. I remembered it was annoying.

My daughter quipped that "No, I had the most annoying alarm ever, and it looked like you", pointing at me. I could only laugh because it was true. She only sort of laughed.

Here is some background. 

My mother went to work full time when I was in sixth or seventh grade. It was my responsibility to get up and go to school. My brother wasn't going to get me up any more than I would have dragged him out of bed. I learned early to put my alarm across the room.  I had to get up to turn it off, so why bother going back to bed? It was effective. I still get up without a snooze. Thus, my patience with chronic snoozers is limited. 

When I went to college, I pledged a fraternity. Pledges lived in the house. One of the duties was to wake up everyone in the fraternity. Wake-up calls started at six and ended at 10 AM. Everyone was entitled to three calls every morning, the last call you had to insist the sleeper was sitting up with feet on the floor.  There were no exceptions, no matter what the sleeper said. Now, we had a small pledge class, so the pool of those on wake-up call duty was limited. Most guys served one day every week or two, depending on class schedule. Usually two guys did the duty, 6-8 and another 8-10. Classes started at a little after 8, so no one would miss an early class doing calls.

I had the misfortune of no classes on Monday, Wednesday, or Friday before 10:30. That meant every MWF I had wake up calls from 8-10. It sucked. Some guys did calls every two weeks, I was doing it three times a week. I became good at my responsibility. I knew the problem sleepers -- the ones who cursed, who begged, who fought. I knew the guys who would refuse to be "dragged". I had a duty, and I did it with ruthless efficiency.  

The next semester, again by chance, I had no classes before 10 on Tuesday or Thursday. Again, guess who got screwed? At least one other brother had the same schedule, so the burden was shared. I spent a lot of time my freshman year waking up the 70+ brothers in the house. 

Anyway, years later, when it came to get my daughter out of bed, I took the same approach. I would shake her the first time until she responded. Fifteen minutes later I shook her until her eyes were open and she could answer me. The third call I was relentless, shaking her and talking to her until she answered, sat up, and put her feet on the floor. In the fraternity I was done at that point, with my daughter I stayed until she was completely up and out of bed. 

Yes, I was an annoying alarm clock. But she got up.