designer dawn

Some days she paints and the mushy, watery pigments of nature blend in edges of mystery. Today, though, mother designs. In the pantone blue west a half moon glows as if stenciled on with a 20mm deckle. Schaedler precision rulers set the deep aqua lake apart from the neat gradient of encroaching dawn in a perfect horizontal line. Eastern sky could be called a "rainbow" but the mesh is more complicated. In the moving mix shades of grape juice, apricot jelly and strawberry candy present fleeting overtones. I can see the caption written out, in perfectly kerned Helvetica. "Dawn" - neatly punctuated at the end by a water pumping station resting on the horizon.

I was tardy for the iPod parade this morning, taping the feet up took a bit longer. After the last run I managed to rip all the skin off the top of my foot. Fuckin nice! Have to be more careful, now. Today the feet send back no messages of pain whatsoever. All systems are go.

"And so what? I am a rock star! I got my rock moves! And I don't need you!"

Out here the dark silhouettes of trees are fast becoming old fashioned. In an hour, charcoal shadows will seem so passé. Why, dark is so night time! Naked limbs expose brown clumps of abandoned birds' nests. I can hear the ticking in the trees. In each branch a countdown nears the zero point when green will explode on the earth. In some day to come we will be shocked with the sudden blessing of leaves.

"I'll be eaten by the worms, and weird fishes. Picked over by the worms, and weird fishes. Weird fishes..."

I look up at soccer hill, opting for the longer path around its circumference today. 8 runners use it to train; I see their black creature-ish silhouettes against the sky. They each go down the hill, then up, then down a different direction, then back up. Together at the top, then breaking into a chaos and then converging at the crest, they are a perfect swarm.

"It's all and illusion. There's too much confusion. I'll make you feel better..."

Rounding that bend which could hook me back north or feed me further south, I take in the perfectly crafted vantage point of Montrose Harbor. My feet yell "next stop: Belmont harbor!" But I look at the time and force them northward, promising that on Sunday we'll go for 10 miles. I promise! From this spot on this clear morning, I can see all the way to Navy Pier. "Navy Piers" he calls it. Silly Italian, he pluralizes everything. "Piers", "Cereals"...

"Something is going on at Navy Piers this weekend I thought maybe we could do that..." Later I get an SMS updating the suggestion to one of going to galleries - a genius stroke. Someone has been doing his homework. He's being awfully friendly; awfully kind and even, maybe, sweet. It's dawning on him that I don't need him, maybe. Maybe he's realizing that I can be pleasant company, after all. But, something has shifted. I'd love to trust the kindness, but I don't. I can't. We'll see how he acts once the green card issue gets resolved.

"I woke up this morning the sun shining brightly I put on my happy face..."

Dawn doesn't just happen at the horizon. The whole sky participates in sunrise. The west takes its cues from the refracting atmosphere and accepts the hug of long pink and purple arms, gently waking the whole dome. A gold glow above the horizon, an atmospheric revealing the hideout of angels, marks the location to watch. There, in moments, the thinnest pink line appears. Line grows into a mound like a bright pimple on the water. Soon, there she is. Blink and you see every step of the sunrise still framed in the retina burn of your eyes. Look at that, will you. Look at that color and drama and tell me it isn't natural for humans to adorn themselves and seek beauty.

Nature itself rolls the drum - such a showoff.
On the other side of me, the drive is starting to fill with southbound traffic. Off to markets and jobs, man rolls the dice - another day.