In the space before daybreak, in the silence that hovers over the frozen earth before the break of day in late autumn, I dress alone in my room and leave, slippers still on my feet. As the red clouds streak the sky above, their salmon hues clashing perfect harmony with the baby blue sky, I unlock my bike in a rush, fearful of missing a moment of splendor. The metal is so cold that my normally coiled bike lock hangs limp, a stretched out spring, and refuses to pop back into place. Indifferent to the layer of frost on my seat and handlebars, I hop on and ride off, the backs of my thighs dampened by the frost, and my hands burning from the iced metal beneath them. I don’t notice.
The stillness is entrancing and the silence engulfing. Perhaps this is why I don’t sleep at night anymore - so that I can have that stillness all to myself. The pond stretches ahead me and the meadow before it is covered in a perfect, virginal, glistening frost. My kickstand squeaks down and I crouch and wait for the right moment. I’m in the middle of the road, but the 50 isn’t going to do it, so I swap in the 85. This is perfect. I wait, at 2 and 80, and bide my time. I’m reasonably sure a car passes. I’ve never been less in a hurry.
Time slows to a stop and I let the stillness take over. There is nothing in the world outside of me and the scene before my eyes: of this, I am convinced. I have never felt a stronger sense of conviction that I am in the right place at the right time. I have never been more sure that this is what I should be doing. I don’t hear the click of the shutter because it sounds like just another breath of life, and the metal of the camera doesn’t burn my hand in the cold because it is a part of me, it is my third eye. I lose myself in time and space while appreciating every moment. I am alive. I am alive, and in this moment, this is all I know for sure.
~MMR