Sunrise world...

There's this different world that exists at sunrise. A silence to the air that is broken by summer birds and the bugs that haven't yet figured it's daylight yet. The street lights also have not been informed and they glow against the dawning sun that sits behind pink and purple clouded skyline. The air is yet chilled, thick and heavy as the Midwest summer air often is, not yet warmed by the overhead rays. My shirt, with its arm holes cut down to my waist, let in the quickening breeze that licks around my exposed sides the faster I pedal my bike down the trail. My body warms with exertion, inner heat emanating from my center and gradually spreading to my extremities. The trail is quiet. Alone. The smell of bakeries on either side, just warming their ovens and taking out their first loaves, wafts down to my nose as I pass. The trail cafe is still closed for another few hours. Down, down to the falls. I pedal faster, push harder, speeding down the road with a different kind of energy. The energy of a full night's rest, legs not wearied yet from working all day. Fresh and blood pumping new, I feel the optimism of new day fill my lungs. I could get used to morning rides and day shifts. I could do this every morning. If I wanted to. Up at 5 and on the road, then back to a shower, quick bite to eat and off to work. Yes, I could do this. Enough of the exhaustion of night shifts that leaves me slave to all-day naps and solitary nights. This. This is what I need. This is up and awake and being alive with the rest of the world, this is communion with the living, this is flowing with the natural cycle of the day instead of fighting against it. This. I want this. I am reminded of a sensation I have not felt since the days of working on the farm. This sense of rightness and congruence with the earth. As day rises, so do we, shaking off hibernation of night to stretch limbs and joints into morning rituals. We wake. The earth wakes. We begin our day's work, rejoicing in the newness, the clean and fresh and reborn day. I remember on the farm, those mornings before the sun made the air hot. The beautiful chill, the dew that collects on your ankles as you walk through the grass and take a seat among the rows of your impending labor. And it is good. It is a good labor and one you are proud and willing to do. It is working with your hands until they are darkened by dirt and soil, black that settles into the cracks and seems to never fully wash out. It's a joyous responsibility to tend the ground, to nurse it, to coax life from it, to revel in the yield. Memories of this good work fill my mind, thoughts that have not been there for years are now brought forward as I work my muscles now on the early morning trail. Traces of many different flowers and plants from nearby gardens mix together with the smell of sprinkler-wet black top and fresh-cut grass. This. Yes. This.