sunrise
One of my favourite things about being in band and choir was getting to see the sunrise every morning because I had to be up so damn early to get there. The sunrise usually hit its most intense moments in the middle of my mid-commute makeup application, when I would pause and drink in the beauty of it. For me, the sunrise was the smell of concealer and the feel of my hands starting to thaw out after scraping ice and frost off the car windows.
In the winter the surise was framed in a white aura from the frost in the corners that didn't get fully scraped. Spring and fall, the sunrise would paint the mist that hung in the hollows and over streams and the river, and that was always the best moment of all.
Sunrise was a moment of not feeling tired even though I'd gotten up at five, and it was a moment of not feeling angry. It was a time of silence. I don't like to talk in the car; sunrise was one of the few times during the ride that I could just sit and think without having my thoughts interrupted.
The Spanish word for smile is sonrisa. It always seemed appropriate to me, given how the sunrise makes me feel.
***
This past week has been a week of all-nighters. I've been working hard without accomplishing enough, and it's frustrated me. I'm also pretty tired, as you can imagine -- yesterday was the first night this week when I fell asleep when it was still dark and night, at the fabulous hour of five thirty a.m. As stressed and exhausted and upset I am, I have gotten to see the sunrise for four mornings this week, every day except yesterday. It's been the best part of my day, every day.
This morning's sunrise was extremely beautiful. It reminded me of how I felt when I was ten and I'd just been introduced to the taste of rosewater. It reminded me of the scent of orange peels drying, the feel of crisply folded origami on red paper with gilded fans painted in a pattern. There were hints of the mouth-feel of white chocolate melting smooth, of the irritatingly soft velvet of ripe peaches, of the scent of the bottom of a pineapple ready to be eaten.
The sunrise is still going on through the gaps in the skyline; it's still beautiful and apricot and pink. It's no longer a sensual mystery, though. Now, it's just the start of another day.