By my son’s standards, it’s still nighttime when I like to wake up. Though I’m just as groggy as anyone, rising early comes easier to me than some because I like to be up early. There’s a peace that comes with morning quiet, when everyone is still asleep and will be that way for a couple of hours. A time for drinking tea instead of coffee because the grinder will wake everyone up (note to self: maybe get a good hand grinder for early mornings).

It’s a time for reading and studying and writing as I am doing now. Lighting a candle. Quiet contemplation of hard words.

The joy of the early hours is worth the stinging eyes that inevitably come when it’s time to wake up after not enough sleep.