Morning

I confess the horrible truth.  I am a morning person.

Please allow me to qualify that.  What I am not is a person who jumps out of bed, singing "Rise and Shine and Give God the Glory," eager to have everyone up with me.  You can stop rolling your eyes now.  I know, we morning people are hated by just about everyone else.  I'm with you - I don't get "that" kind of morning person at all.

Me, I'm a lover of quiet, of solitude.  I love the fact that when I wake up, my mind is clear and hasn't been crowded by all of the frustrations, irritations and noise of the day.  Nobody wants to talk to me (since the people with whom I live are NOT morning people) and the largest demand placed on me is from one or all of my dogs, wanting to be taken out.

I am currently reading the most wonderful book, Quiet: the Power of Introverts in a World that Can't Stop Talking by Susan Cain.  I am loving this book.  I read a chapter the other night that had me wanting to phone everyone I know to tell them about how it impressed upon me.  She was citing research by Kagan about "high-reactive" and "low-reactive" infants and the connection of that to introversion.  Introverts are often "high-reactive" meaning that they are very sensitive to all of the stimuli around them.  That's me (and Pk, for sure).  I notice everything and the background noise makes life very overwhelming sometimes.

Then, there's morning.  It's like the background noise has been turned down on life.  I have taken to running in the very early morning and I feel as if there is this wonderful secret town out there - a town of wandering cats, squirrels and skunks.  It's a time of day when I am able to hear the intensity of the crickets and the grasshoppers.  I smell the smells - the faint smell of cows up by one field, the wildflowers in another and, always in the early morning, the small whiffs of skunk.  I can hear the sound of the rushing stream as I jog by and even, on some days, the lowing of the cattle.

I get to see another side of the human inhabitants of the town, too.  I've always been a 9-5er so I assume nobody is up a this time but me.  How wrong I am.  There are the fellow runners and we nod at each other.  There is the man down the road who leaves each morning wearing his safety vest and carrying his lunchbox, walking to the corner to get his morning ride.  There is the one bus that goes by in the half hour of my run, usually with only one passenger.  There is the first wave of dog walkers - generally those with small dogs on leash (those of us with bigger and busier dogs wait until later when the risk of rabbits and skunks has passed).  There are the many  who commute or who run their own businesses who are out early to get a head start on the day.  It's a wonderful time for watching.

My ideal morning, I think, would consist of a run, a shower and then, a cup of tea and a good book on the deck with my family all still asleep.  I crave that peace and on the rare occasions that my morning begins the way that I dream, I go into my day with so much more focus and calm.

Good morning!