I love sleep.

When I don’t have to be at work or at an appointment early, my first impulse is always to sleep in. To sleep late. To luxuriate under the covers with no demands made on me.

When my husband has to be up early, I get up with him and see him off, and then I make myself a cup of coffee and take it back to bed. I might drink half of it but then I go back to sleep.

This feels like a total gift.

Other times, however, I stay up. Like today. I went outside in the dark and looked at the sky. I looked at the snow. I smelled the air. I breathed it all in. I felt the crunching ice under my boots. I realized that being outside in the dark at this early hour was helping me feel grounded in place. It conveyed an “I am right where I am supposed to be” feeling to me that helped me feel calm and centered. Connected not only to the physical world but to myself, as well as to all of the other people that might have also been up early, looking up at the sky.

Like you?