TheBanyanTree: Up At Dawn

[NancyIee at aol.com]

Mornings are the best part of the day. Actually, they start before dawn, when 
the sky is just light enough to see the faint outline of the window in a dark 
room. That's when I wake.

The neighbor's rooster crows when I am finishing my first cup of coffee and 
putting on my shoes, my outside shoes, as opposed to those I wear in the house. 
The horses are already waiting for breakfast. The pigs are already squabbling 
over food they have yet to receive.

The horses get oats and a feed mix. The pigs get their ration from the feed 
store, plus "stuff" from the box I get from the local produce stand: overripe 
cantalopes and tomatoes, soft cucumbers and squash, wrinkly fruit.  It's a sort 
of therapy to mush my hands around, removing seeds, breaking large pieces 
into small pieces, making slop out of it all.

"Goat" the goat comes to see what's going on, and he dances around, 
pretending he's going to butt me if I don't hurry and get his breakfast. He better be 
pretending. He's like a deer, bounding about, flying to the top of his picnic 
table, the only goat in the county with his own picnic table, and dancing 
toward me again. Luckily he has no horns.

The pigs fight for real over the slop, though there's plenty. The horses 
finish their morning grain and get turned out into the pasture, where they gallop 
en-herd around the pond. The sandhill cranes take flight with much squawking, 
settling down again when they realize it's only the horses. Small ones, at 
that.

The goat finds his food set out on the picnic table, so he can protect it 
from the greedy younger horses. The pigs settle down to some serious gobbling and 
shlurping.

I stand a moment to watch the herd of miniature horses race around the pond 
again as the sun rises, turning them all to gold.

NancyLee