(Cold) Walking

I had to get up extra early this morning to get to work before a breakfast with the Provost that started at 7am. Since September, I've been riding my bike to work, but this has been getting harder and harder because of the weather. Leaving the house today at 630 instead of my usual 800, coupled with the fact that it was three degrees outside made the decision to walk instead of riding justifiable.

Living in the Pacific Northwest for almost nine years now, one of the things I've come to really love is the dry, clear cold that accompanies most winter days. Unlike back in the Midwest, where winter involves a cloudy, grey sky and general soddenness 80% of the time, here the desert climate keeps the sky clear the majority of the time and gives you a strikingly crystalline view of the stars at night if you're anywhere that's not a Walmart parking lot.

So despite my initial griping about not being able to get a ride to work with Lindsey, I was actually really excited about freezing my ass off on a walk when I realized it was going to still be dark outside while I was walking. Our neighborhood couldn't be described as "busy" at the busiest of times, let alone at 625 in the morning, and though the sun hadn't yet risen up from behind the hills to the east, it was high enough that the newly snow-encrusted mountains to the west and across the lake were barely visible, while the stars were still out in a sky just a little more blue than black.

Though I'm typically loathe to get up this early on purpose, the half hour or so before sunrise is one of my favorite times of day, especially in the winter. Where, on good days at least, sunset often instills me with a sense of "job well done" at the end of the day (whether that job be my actual job, or just hiking or watching TV), sunrise makes me feel like I'm getting to see the world before anything's really started. It's sort of like the time I was on the Pirates of the Caribbean ride as a kid and the ride broke down, and we had to exit by going back behind the scenery and through the employees' area. In terms of the coming day, nothing's happened yet, but nothing can happen yet. It's a weird sort of liminal space, made more so by the cold: nobody wants to be out in the world because there's nothing to do yet, and it's cold, but the world's still there. In 30 minutes or so it'll be business as usual. But not yet.

Usually, I leave for work about 90 minutes later, and when I do, the day's already in full swing. But not today. Not yet.