As the anniversary of my 30th year approaches, I decided I wanted to give my parents a picture of another sunrise, my 10,954th dawn.
So, on Saturday morning, I woke uncharacteristically before the sun and rushed to a picturesque location in Rancho Vistoso. Ironically, despite my name, I'm quite the sleeper and rarely up with the morning birds, so I'm unfamiliar with the precise moment that the sun creates those magnificent pinks I've heard so much about and have seldom seen.
As I made my way through the maze of roads from here to there watching the East intently, the sky lightened to a matted blue-gray and the birds chirped their morning songs. I didn't think I was going to make it to a pretty spot before the sun peeked over the mountains! I had such adrenaline rushing through me in my urgency to beat the sun and it felt like I was arriving to a show just before they close the doors and stop admitting spectators. But I found my seat just in time, before the show began. I even had time to look around to scope out just the right vantage point.
When the changes in light began, I was enamored and I wondered why I don't get up to enjoy more of these free displays - a daily gift I take for granted because I'm more owl-like and tend to stay up late (as I'm doing now to put my blog to bed) and I usually prefer to sleep in as long as possible, long past the morning's first light. That habit may have to change.
It turns out that the magic moment is literally right before the sun graces the horizon, or in our case, the top of the Catalina Mountains. It was amazing how quickly the dawn-event transpired. The sky remained quite dull and then suddenly, pink, yellow, and orange hues highlighted the clouds and the blue of the atmosphere intensified briefly to a deep saturation.
I laid crookedly on rocks embedded in the ground, shooting up at the sky. I don't think I look at the sky enough, and I always feel better when I do.
The sun's rays and beams seemed delicate at first, twinkling (like stars do) before fully rising above the mountain peaks, and they dazzled me as they back-lit little buds and flowers, normally so seemingly insignificant, they now seemed the most beautiful thing.
Welcome, new light. Hello, new day. I ask myself, "What are you going to do with it, Dawn?"
A whirl of images from memories flickered through my mind like a flipbook - a book that spans the past 10,954 earth rotations. That's a lot of spinning and quite a dance through space. I'm finding that the questions and struggles that plague many new 30 year olds, including me, are: "Have I really used each day to its full capacity up until now?" "Where did the last decade go?" and "Is this where I thought I'd be by now?"
It's not that I'm unhappy; that's not it, not in the least. I'm a very happy individual. I love my God, my husband, my family, my home, my cat. I have so much to hope for still, to dream about, learn about, and to share, but there is a slight mourning for a decade that's gone. Should of, would of, could of - too late for regrets; move on, right? This feeling is a lesson, I guess - if you don't want to mourn time gone by, then don't wait; do it today. See as many dawns as you can.
Thousands more await me,
Dawn
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