The sounds of my 5am morning are equal parts industrial to hesitant.
Clinical in their methods, the street worker sweeps the street as auto-pilot is in full motion. Every morning they whistle the same hums, the same routes, the same routines…. a manufactured orchestra of consistency.
The commuter hasn’t yet allowed the coffee to wipe the sleep from her eyes and every move is a little tentative, still a beat behind her normal pace. Her domesticity put on hold for hours, most times at will but sometimes by default; industry beckons her day.
The same street lamp shines. It is well intentioned, but serves too often as too early a wake up for too many residents. The beam is relentless in its strength, often an annoyance stemming more from duty than choice. It is fact: It knows its job, but likes it no less and certainly enjoys the cornucopia of morning curses no more than the day before.
Once again, he rolled out of bed on sheer determination than accord. He is up. And moving. Panting beneath my window, every morning he struggles to catch his breath as the morning chill ices over his lungs. His music always turned a touch too loud as though it will manufacture the will to take the next step. By the time he reaches the end of the block, I always imagine he has turned it down at least a few clicks because the cobwebs have cleared a bit more and the chill doesn’t sting as badly as it did 25 steps ago. His hesitancy wanes to determination, decision.
Yellow cars with glowing crowns still race down the side streets because not enough have chosen to join the man who pants outside my window to make their recklessness a hazard. They race on the final fumes of caffeine; race to switch over their shifts; race to their beds; or perhaps to see their children off to school. They race mindlessly, hesitant they are actually seeing that businessman flag them down. They wonder, “Will this be opposite of home?” They race to beat the bus that threatens to keep them trapped at a light as a result of their slow moving starts.
I am simply an observer of this morning. It is, they are, a morning full of symphony.
A City in Colour 