I love mornings.

When I was… maybe in the 5th or 6th grade, or younger – I’m not sure – I used to get up early and write. I would always make a cup of Earl Gray with too much sugar in the fancy blue cups with the saucers. I’d sit in front of our PC, my mom’s exercise music in the background, and click away in my pajamas. I had aspirations of writing a novel. Young adult, fantasy.

When I was in high school, getting up early was less of a choice and more of a requirement. By then I was making time for yoga, not writing, but I still had to catch the bus. I hated riding the bus, mostly because of the other rowdy teenagers. With no one I ever really knew on that bus to talk to, their chatter seemed crass, overwhelming, infringing on the possible meditations of the hour (poetic snobbery? I am guilty). But I was the first stop, so my only favorite part of the bus ride was the stretch when it was just the bus driver and I, trucking down Gold Camp Road. With the glowing mountains at my back, the still, glimmering city stretched out to the glorious sunrise. The colors in my memory are Intense.

I liked that bus driver. I don’t remember her name now, but we had some good chats on that stretch.

These days, 7:30 is typically my earliest. But this morning, I was awakened by my boyfriend getting an early morning call and suddenly having to head out much earlier than we expected. I found myself sitting in the kitchen alone, with two full cups of Earl Gray, the sink dripping forlornly, and the city starting to buzz. I admire the shade of the sky. The quality of light in the early mornings is what I love most. Is it gray? Pale blue? Tinged with pinks and yellows? Like a perfectly pale streaked Easter egg. Those in between shades…

But what’s my inclination? To write.

Here’s a poem about mornings in my neighborhood that I wrote not too long ago:
mission morning

mission morning
laundry lines
tangled stairs
bright
teal and adobe
mysterious murals
the Green Lady
leads
our search
for 5
interlocked
interpretations

see: bright sky
hear: restaurant clatter
smell: ripe melon
taste: torta gorda
feel: sharp-edged palm leaves
on my cheek
contrasts
your
sweet
kiss

written september.23.2010
remembering september.20.2010