C I P R I A N I

There is a magic to the hours prior to the dawn, something secret about it, comforting.  And depending from which direction you come upon it, I find it curious that the perception of those hours change.

For example, being up all night and finding oneself face to face with four am, five am.  Depending on the prior evening’s activities, there is a feeling of perhaps survival and to a larger degree, immortality:  

You have defeated the night!  You have fought through it to greet the sunrise without retreating to slumber!

Now, of course, this would be a good night.

You could could be so drunk or lost or heartbroken by four in the morning that such feelings of immutable spirit are consigned to oblivion in the midst of your terrible despair…or inebriation.

I remember a sunrise in college…  

I would like to say that I greeted the great ball of fire with the love of my life, or at least a love of my youth, for something of such splendor seems like the perfect romantic moment.

Alas, that wasn’t the case.  I was, however, with a good friend, and while not a brother by blood, a cousin, so a brother nonetheless.

We had been up all night and actually found ourselves searching for the sunrise.  We travelled around Morgantown on a quest for a good spot to view the light break over the horizon.  

I’m certain there’s a perfect spot in town, and we didn’t really have to travel far from where we were at the start of the journey, but we felt the need to pursue the perfect spot to take in such wonder…  

However, in our ambling around the hilly terrain, we had no such luck finding this optimum patch of land.  We continued to drive around creation and we soon discovered ourselves surrounded by the first morning brilliance, finally realizing that we had indeed “missed it” when we glimpsed the orange orb already shining in the sky above.

And then I believe we went to Eat and Park and had breakfast.

And speaking of romantic moments, I may be confusing evenings but earlier that night may have been one of the most romantic of my young life…  

An unexpected kiss from a girl that I never dreamed of actually kissing.  And come to think of it, the sweetness of that night was spoiled only by pursuing it the next day and trying to turn it into something more than what it was…

At least metaphorically, it would make perfect sense that the search for the sunrise and that kiss earlier in the evening would have happened on the same night.  I’ll have to confirm with my cousin, but until then, I’ll say it indeed happened on the same night…

This morning I find myself coming upon the dawn in the other direction, as one of my age is prone to do.  Waking up a few hours early – after going to bed at say 10pm, when one’s romantic college nights of chasing girls and sunrises are long gone.  When the duties of the day are trying to do good work, be a good husband and last, but certainly not least, a good father.  So there is a different feeling of accomplishment when you arrive at those dark hours before the dawn, when those hours are used well.   

Reading, writing, meditating…

Of course, old age doesn’t completely extinguish foolishness and wasted time, but in the quiet, now keenly aware of so much noise in daily life, I’m aware of so much distraction.  But now, in these glorious moments of quiet in the darkness, I find almost as much promise as those days long ago of chasing sunrises.   

After all, when one is able to begin in those hours, one has a head start.

And I have been up for a few hours now…and it’s still early enough to go back to bed and catch a few winks.   As those winks are more important to me now than the sunrise at this particular moment.

But as I burn through a couple passages in a few books and write a little, I’m struck by how much gets done in theses few quiet hours, and regret that I didn’t discover this earlier.

Oh, how much more I could have accomplished!

But I suspect that is part of a man’s advancement from the days of chasing sunrises to gaining a modicum of wisdom, such as it is.