I get up early in the morning, therefore the alarm clock is set for me, though it is a rare day that I awake after 4:30, well before it sounds. I come upstairs, sip my coffee and Splenda, prepare my breakfast, take my vitamins, and jot down my thoughts. It is the preferred way to begin a day in Laura Land.

At seven or eight, I trod down to our bedroom and climb into bed behind Miles and rub his back, murmuring his name, to awaken him for the day. He usually greets me quite jovially and cuddles back a bit. This morning was not so much in line with the usual reaction.

It was a clumsy beginning anyway, after a cat startled me while brushing my teeth and I spit most of the toothpaste on my chin and shirt. Then, my mouth filled to the brim with mouthwash, I had a sneezing fit. Use your imagination. I could be a walking deodorant commercial: "I just ate onions, but you'd never know it to smell my chest!" It was with these experiences in my recent history that I prepared to wake my cute husband.

I massaged his back, his neck, talking to him, greeting him. He mumbled something incoherent, and I continued stroking, cooing, until he muttered that I stole one of his pillows last night and he had to wait until I got up to steal it back. Humored but thinking better of humility over laughter, I apologized and became properly self-derisive of my pillow philandering ways.

I lingered over a knot in his spine and massaged it out, issuing butterfly kisses, still doing my damnedest to coax him awake. Finally he rolled over, squinting into the dim light and raising one of his gentle-giant hands to pummel my forehead. It felt like a brushing of flower petals upon my skin and I giggled at the unexpected response. "I don't have a snooze button, Honey."

He nodded against my claim and proceeded to execute the move no less than five times. Finally, he groaned and flipped to his front, flinging a hand over his head. Feeling sympathetic, I offered, "I'll come back in ten minutes, how does that sound?" He grunted affirmatively and I pranced upstairs to inhale more of the peppermint fumes from the bathroom and update the site.

...And it strikes me that my snooze button worked after all. My husband...he's no fool. I guess looks really are  deceiving.