early morning

Crack of thunder woke me up this morning at 4:00 am and intruded my dreams. In pitch black darkness, waited with my eyes closed to fall back asleep... but nothing. Just that familiar grasping of the invisible hand inside my chest each time I thought of the consequences of having my morning interrupted so early. I sat and waited for the second crack of thunder, at the very least if the weather was inconsiderate enough to wake me at four, at least it should have the decency of giving me a great thunderstorm to listen to.

No such luck. The room stayed quiet except for the faint murmurings of things I could hear while wearing earplugs. Underwater muffled sounds of a fan blowing and the sound of someone snoring far in the distance. After an hour of listening and feigning sleep, I decided to remove those foam cylinders from my ear cavities so I could scratch the inside of my ears and searched for a possible cat above my head. No such luck. It was decided that coffee should be made and I should stop torturing myself. This likely is a mistake, waking up, which I will probably discover some time mid afternoon, but one can only stay in bed for so long.

I tiptoe through a pitch black apartment, imagining that perhaps there is someone in the apartment watching me. I feel someone watching me, feel a presence there, somewhere... but I'm just scaring myself again. I imagine maybe its the ghost of my grandmother whose ashes I keep in a closet full of old Halloween costumes and large, rolled up charcoal drawings of nude figures on butcher paper. Perhaps it is her in the apartment. Walking to the kitchen, I stir the air and the paper towels whisper. This does not diminish the illusion that there is some unknown presence wandering around the dark morning with me. Like a child afraid of the dark, I switch on the oven light, as turning on the light has always been the only real way to get rid of the monsters hiding in the closet.

Coffee always seems to taste better in a coffee shop. I think there is something about being completely surrounded by the smells of coffee, the clinks and clanks and whizzing sounds of the espresso machine, bad indie folk in the background. Certain foods and beverages always seem to taste better if imbibed in the right atmosphere. Skim milk in my coffee this morning turns it an odd shade of gray, like the pallor of death. The taste is there, and the caffeine seems to do the trick, or does something anyways. I envy the cat who is able to fall asleep anywhere she pleases, curled up in the most impossible of places at any old time she chooses. If only sleep were so easy.

I think I'm more tired than I'm letting myself believe. The weather report is not showing any rain. I think that crack of thunder was part of a dream.