Night Is a World Lit By Itself

I've been spending more time up in the middle of the night lately. I used to love that time when the world was sleeping and I was up reading or writing or taking melancholy self-portraits. Then I grew to loathe the hours after midnight and before the dawn, if I was up it meant sleep-deprivation the next day. The classes would be hard to sit through or I would need an extra jolt of caffeine to stay alert during the monotonous commute. I became a crepuscular being, enjoying the dusk and dawn the most. I loved driving eastward to work as the sun slowly creeped over the Wasatch range, violent colors of the day's birth streaking the sky.

Now I've come to love the middle of the night once more. I have nowhere to be at 7 am, I can nap if I want to. At first Olivia loved being awake then, staring and grasping. Now she just likes to chug her bottle in peace while I gently rock her and read. The wind often blows and I sit in comfortable silence and think about the turn my life has suddenly taken.

Olivia and I sent Bob back to work today, he was at the end of his paternity leave. It's just the four of us now, and everyone seems to be napping by me. I think they're on to something, the middle of the night is so much more interesting than the middle of the afternoon.

(By four of us I mean me, Olivia, and the dogs Maggie and Sammi.)