Waking in Late Autumn

Posted on Nov 11, 2007 in Life | 0 comments

Darkness envelops the room, unscathed by the feeble early morning November light. More (though greener) light comes from the digital clock on my bedside table, though I cannot read its glowing face without my glasses. There’s no need to see it, however; the alarm chirruping from my cell phone–rather than a bird–tells me that it’s 6 a.m.

Without looking, I quickly silence the phone’s alarm with fingers trained by repetition. My wife lies to my left, undisturbed by the noise. She will sleep another two hours before her own alarm rouses her. I am jealous of this fact, yet I turn toward her warm body and kiss her back. The demands of the upcoming day crowd out the remnants of my dreams. The minute I’ve allowed myself to enjoy the comfort of my bed has become five and again my phone insists I get up.

Glasses bring what little light there is in the room into focus.  I stand unsteadily and stumble toward the bathroom, kicking aside the extra pillow I’d tossed from the bed the previous evening after reading. The well-worn carpet beneath my feet is a stark contrast to cool linoleum that greets me in the bathroom.

Light assaults me with harsh violence as I flick the switch. The fan, too, seems impossibly loud at this hour but experience tells me it will not wake my wife nor the woman in the unit below. I shut the door and stand at the sink, noting the wave of disheveled hair sculpted by six hours against my pillow.

Mercifully, the water splashed into my face brings the first sense of alertness back to me. My pupils have made peace with the three bulbs above the mirror. I start the shower and yawn, which simultaneously causes my jaw to pop like a firecracker and alerts me to the sour taste of morning breath. The hot water from the shower brings me all the way to my senses and I run through the familiar patterns of washing and thinking of what I must do today.

I leave the bathroom fan–and therefore the light–running after my shower, and it’s by this illumination that I chose my clothes. After only the briefest fashion checks (“can I wear a brown shirt with these khakis? No, try the blue shirt instead”) I dress, pulling on socks and a belt before packing my pockets with wallet, pen, bluetooth headset, and a few quarters. I return to the bed, this time on the opposite side, and kiss my wife. She mumbles “I love you,” a sentiment I return and tell her to have a good day and be safe; she tells me to, too. It is a conversation only I will remember. Fully awake now, I no longer begrudge her the additional rest as I did 25 minutes earlier.

Within the kitchen fixture hangs an energy-efficient bulb, and its muted glow intensifies while I grab the leftovers from the fridge I’d prepared the night before for my lunch. The bulb is only just fully awake when I, now wearing shoes and jacketed, flick it off again. It will snooze another hour or so before my wife rouses it again, when its light will add to the feeble rays of a Northwest November filtering through our windows.

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