Waking Early
It’s dark. It’s
always dark when I wake in the mornings.
I am a light sleeper, waking easily to the chirp of a cat walking by and
saying hello in the night, hearing the clink of the mailbox as the paper is delivered,
listening to the back-up beepers on the garbage truck, noticing the ruckus in the
sounds of my bed mate snoring.
Even when
there aren’t sounds to wake me, I wake up at all hours. The cat snuggles too close to my head for
comfort. I need to visit the
bathroom. My thinking is traveling too
quickly to allow sleep. I wake up
easily.
I like the darkness.
I like the softness of being unable to see beyond my window panes, the
feeling of being surrounded by woolly night, cradled in the arms of unseen
possibilities. There is a sense of the
unknown and of being in a cocoon of darkness, of excited wonder at what the new
day will bring, uncover, tear open and reveal.
Even if it is too early and still dark, I’ve learned to get up and
begin the day rather than to stay in bed and fret about not sleeping. And there are advantages to being awake
before anyone else. The house feels peaceful,
softly lit with every creature asleep except for me.
If I step outside, I appreciate the night and the darkness. The stars shine brightly. I can see them better without the light
pollution of cars going by. The moon is
lovely, ethereal and round, misty and comforting of late.
The early morning allows space for my own quiet self
to begin the day slowly, with silent meditation and fragrant coffee, with
focused attention to every detail…the lights of the city sparkling through the
darkness, the neighbours’ homes all asleep except one, the welcome cosiness of
that one neighbour’s lit windows, the changing sky as sunrise tips the edge of
night from black to indigo, then blushes into dawn.
It’s dark. It’s
early. It’s peaceful…a good start to my
day.
The words are copyright ©Carol Steel. The photo is used with permission from Wikipedia
commons images.
