like pearls in a rosary

In the morning I wake up and stay in bed while I do connections and wordle and lately the brackets thing, and I read the headlines. If I'm smart I meditate and the day goes better but I don't always. Then I go out on the balcony and look at the buildings around me, the grass and trees in the courtyard, the sky. I track birds if they're flying and try to see where their nests are. I am self-conscious while doing this in good and bad ways but I do it anyway. If it's a reasonable day I keep the balcony door open and the fresh air flows through the house. I put the coffee on the stove (I set it up the day before, usually) and get the things I need for breakfast from the fridge. I have a multivitamin and water, an egg on toast, a cup of coffee with cream. Nearly every morning I think about how beautiful the pepper flakes are, or how much I like salt, or how good even a little butter makes everything taste. I try to study Spanish for 15 minutes while I drink my coffee. Then I wash the dishes, set up the coffee again, wipe down the counters and the table. I open one of the four windows and look out at the street to see if anything is new or interesting, and then I open the blinds on each side, which I think makes the windows look like a face with its eyes open. These are the thoughts I have nearly every morning and I do the same thing nearly every morning and it makes me ridiculously content. In middle school (I think) I read "A New England Nun" and sentences from it pop in my mind sometimes. It's not that I don't think new thoughts; I do. Every morning against this easy background of fresh air, coffee, and toast I have time to think about what I've read and what I want to write, the richness and wonder of friends, concrete and abstract ideas. Sometimes I think if I could make my life as patterned as I have made my mornings I would be absolutely flush with contentedness; other times I try this and I can't seem to stick with it, but it's early days as an uncloistered nun and I may get there if I can keep in mind how easy it would be and how satisfying, to know what happens next.