Shameless Commerce Department
The Maine Crime Wave comes to you on May 30th. Register here. Guest of Honor is Ron Currie, Jr. Noir at the Bar the night before, as well as a curated trip through the research facilities of the Maine Historical Society. Don’t miss it!
And On
Those of you who’ve been following along know that I was semi-immobilized for a number of weeks this winter with knee replacement surgery. 
One of the (many) things I was concerned about beforehand was what it might do to my writing, in terms of schedule, how much time I could spend in the chair, and everything else that goes to make up the highly subjective and superstitious ways and means we all have of getting our work done.
Normally, my writing life went like this: get up, drink coffee, work out, write, then go to work. (I had the advantage of a professional schedule that let me to get my own work done before anyone else’s.) Even in retirement, that schedule didn’t change much, only elongated a little.
One of the many disadvantages of major surgery is that, for the first while afterward, the patient does not sleep well. In my case, this amounted to 4 AM icings 
for the offending joint, a general sense the sleeping unoperated-on world was a lot smarter than I was, and a curiosity about how long it would take before I could say I was glad I’d done this to myself.
After a couple days of that no-audience whining, lying on the couch with the leg up, it occurred to me that I could divert myself by trying to write—well before I was nominally awake, well before coffee, well before anyone else in my house stirred. (This last was critical.) I made no plan but sat (lay) with a pad and a pen.
Without getting deep into the details, by the time I was past the twelve weeks or so it took to get me substantially healed, I was surprised to realize I was writing a thousand words every morning and actually had the first draft of a new book.
“The morning hour has gold in its mouth.” The aphorism is variously attributed to the Germans or the Italians; I’d always heard it as something Goethe had said. 
What I’d relearned is that those first few hours, before the day rushes in, before you start scrolling for the news, before your living companions start to need you, are precious, and somehow more fruitful than the same number of hours later in the day.
And if, like me, you’re someone no one wants to talk to in the morning anyway, maybe this might be a good enough reason to try it. I am curious, though. How many of you do write first thing in the morning?
