Sunrise

This is an excerpt from the weekly News-Loveletter. If you would like it sent to your inbox directly (with all the other juicy bits, including a mini joy practice), you can add yourself to my mailing list here.

On Friday morning, I wriggled out of a sleeping bag and piles of quilts to unzip our tent at the crack of dawn. Seda, beside me, mumbled incoherently. “There might be a stellar sunrise!” I whispered.

And there was. I rezipped the fly and picked my way carefully over our sleeping adult children to exit the side of the tent where my shoes awaited.

We had set up camp at one a.m. to get some sleep on our way to Phoenix. Trinidad had chosen the perfect place — an isolated patch of BLM land with bouldering (rock climbing) and world famous chalcedony stones.

I wrapped my coat around me and gasped in wonder at the sky. Gold, red, and amber stretched up into blue. Stars shimmered at my back. I clapped my mittened hands with joy at the Joshua Trees standing upright in dark silhouette. Twenty eight degrees Fahrenheit, and I felt my heart bursting with warmth. In the distance, a wild burro and her baby shared the moment with me.

December is kind to offer sunrise after six a.m. A desert sunrise with my family nearby? It nearly sent me over the top. What greater gift than this?