Lights On!

pardon the absence of most caps, but mt typing sucks more than usual lately so i'm going to go all e.e.cummings on you.

I was nearing the end of my two week stay at st.joe's last July when the night nurse came by and woke me up (naturally) to take my vitals. my stay started out in the ER, and from there I went to the second floor, then the fourth, the fifth and finally the tenth. oddly enough, this was the oncology unit, but it was there that a bed was available. lucky me; and i mean that leterally. it turns out to have been a quite fortuitous room change.

now, I have never been much of a sunrise lover, for two reasons I think. 1. I'm a night owl by nature and am never awake that early, and 2. I've never lived in a place that had a good viewpoint facing east. my room on the tenth floor faced due east, and on that morning I was treated to sight I can remember vividly even today --
the most magnificent sight I have ever set eyes upon.

last summer was a season for wildfires, which was why this sunrise was so spectacular. the night sky didn't just lighten, it started by turning purple, then lightening shade by shade, and when my nurse came in I asked him to stop for a moment to watch this with me. and he did. he took a few minutes and stood by my side and we watched as the sun crested the horizon and showed it's russet face to the world. It truly was the most brilliant red one could imagine -- a magnificent start to any day. He lingered a bit to savor the moment at which time he took my hand and thanked me for slowing him down long enough to see it. He said that he had worked there two years and had never seen the sunrise. I smiled and suggested he look out the window more often seeing as he was, after all, on the tenth floor..

I then told him that they likely weren't all so lovely, due to the wildfires this year. he agreed, and went about his business as the sun rose higher and became paler and I decided to go back to sleep.


If ANYONE out there in the blogosphere runs across this entry and knows of a picture of this sunrise, Please,please,please send it to me.