Some call it Wednesday. Others call it Hump Day. Dante called it Hell.

Dante’s Inferno is the story of a journey through the nine circles of the underworld, told by Dante himself. Each circle represents a residence for different kinds of sinners. He starts:

In the midway of this mortal life,

I found me in a gloomy wood, astray

According to certain biblical interpretations in those times, the half-way point of life was around 35. This is a perfectly fine analysis of Dante’s use of “midway.” But when I woke up this morning to the cruelty that was my Wednesday alarm, on this, the midway of a week, I had to wonder: “Is this the ‘Hell’ to which Dante was referring all along?”

First Circle: Limbo

When the alarm first goes off, there is a moment before we actually wake up in which we are unable to reside in the heavenly state of sleep, but have not yet been subjected to the punishments of wakefulness. Unfortunately, we do not stay in this circle long.

Second Circle: Lust

Here we begin to feel “passionate cravings” (Dictionary.com) for more sleep. This cannot be happening. I need at least a few more minutes. Snooze button.

Third Circle: Gluttony

But who ever hits the snooze button just once? Merriam and Webster define gluttony as greedy or excessive indulgence. Ten minutes. Twenty minutes. Thirty minutes. It seems like every time we slip back into our dreams, our eardrums are pounded by the racket of whatever alarm tone we have set.

Fourth Circle: Greed

With each alarm we get more and more desperate. The illusion that just a few more minutes of shut eye will banish our fatigue is waning, but the intensity of our desire for more rest is only increasing. We have become creatures void of all reason as we hit the snooze button with all the force of a stock broker snatching at a window of opportunity.

Fifth Circle: Anger

But the alarm has the nerve to sound again. Seemingly twenty seconds after we turned it off, the worst invention of all time screeches at us, forcing us again to struggle with the question: “Should I get up this time?”

Sixth Circle: Heresy

No. We won’t get up this time, and do you know why? Because the generally accepted belief that work should start before the sun comes up is a mass-produced lie. We should not, nay, will not conform to this societal norm, because it is preposterous! Disgusting! We will sleep in. When we wake up, we will look for a new job, in another country that more appropriately values beauty sleep, if necessary.

Seventh Circle: Violence

Still, something prevents us from turning the alarm completely off. The prospect of financial insecurity, perhaps. The next time the snooze time has run out, we throw the alarm clock across the room so hard that it has no choice but to spark, shatter, and shut up.

Eighth Circle: Fraud

The crash is too loud, and the guilt over having just broken an expensive piece of electronics forces us to rise from the dead. Since we are up, we might as well go to work. But there is so little time to get ready. We rush. We tie our bed-head hair into a bun or wet down yesterday’s gel to make ourselves look descent. We rehearse our lies in the car, and we tell our bosses that we had a family emergency. They forgive us this time and we look forward to our next pay check.

Ninth Circle: Treachery

Next Tuesday night, we grudgingly pick a new alarm tone, tuck ourselves in and try to fall asleep in the wake of tomorrow morning’s hardships. But maybe it will be different. A person should really only need four or five hours of sleep, anyway. And we set a calmer ringtone to wake us up this time…

Hours later, we start the cycle over. It annoys us like it promised not to. We smash it like we promised not to. All parties feel betrayed.

That is the tragedy Dante’s Inferno attempts to convey.

“‘Abandon every hope, you who enter.'” – Inscription on the gate of Hell

He’s a metaphorical genius, am I right?

Coming soon: Dante’s Purgatorio: The Seven Deadly Sins of Traffic Jams