Early Early Hurley Burley

I'm a writer. I like quiet -- big, wide, uncluttered, expansive quiet. To say I’m an early bird would be an understatement. Any day that begins later than about 4:00 am for me, doesn’t seem worth bothering with. What’s the point? I mean by 5:00 people are already getting up around me, taking showers, flushing toilets, honking horns, emptying trash, interrupting my perfect black velvet silence. And to make matters worse, by 6:00am, you have all the joggers and fitness folks starting to swarm about like ants, running up and down their local ant hills with their little go-go legs, infecting an otherwise innocent day with their show-offy, self-righteous quads, glutes, biceps and oh-so flat abs.

Shhhh …

But wait, it’s still quiet. To be alone and quiet is the best. In the wee hours, I can hear myself think. I can hear my tea brew. I can hear my heart beat and my thoughts swimming about like koi in my private pond. They make small, polite, nearly invisible silver ripples across the surface of my day.

Ahhhh …

Brand new day, fresh as new white linen bed sheets, fresh as new white wooly snow, uninterrupted, plain like plain white paper with thin blue lines, each blue line waiting like an empty shelf, inviting me to pile up little stacks of letters there. Go ahead string together some a-e-i-o-u’s and sometimes y’s here and see what you can come up with.

I’m thinking of things that make me grin up and frown down … sorting through yesterday’s comings and goings … did he really SAY that? Did she really MEAN that? Was she really WEARING that hat? Did he really believe anyone would BELIEVE him? And in the margins of my mindful mind, a stray cat wanders by. Grey.

In a flash, I recall seeing a little scene in a restaurant, twisting back to another red booth, I spot the upturned face of a small boy, like a sweet, shiny coin, begging his mum for a puppy. He could live in a box in my room! She was having none of it.

Photo Credit: Panama-guide.com