Tom's Thumb: A Granite Treat

   I found myself rousing my sleep deprived body from the concentrated mess of the bed and sitting upright, feet gently touching the cool wood floors. Two hours of sleep had once again reared its monstrous face upon my world leaving me staring blankly into space gauging my coming approach to the new day, with a sun rising quickly and sharply outside to the east as if to say:

"I wait for no one. Follow if you choose. If not you will not be missed on this day."

   My goal was to wake my sleeping beauty as is nearly almost always needed(then again who would want to wake to this world on most days?), drop her upon her place of employment doorstep and from there follow a carefully calculated route across Maricopa County zig-zagging the jumbled hulking city all the while ascending and descending six of the highest points in Maricopa County by foot.
   But, plans are futile. Plans, are, plans.

   When a sun rises and sets there within lies our chances to explore our gift of life, existence. To some that may range from reading a great book from dawn to dusk while to others it may mean spending a day standing over an operating table, hands fumbling, angling throughout, piecing together bodies in the way they were mean to be, leaving their hands aching with pain awaiting the next life threatening injury to bound through the adjacent double doors. There is no tried and true path to this exploration, only the guilt that comes with letting night fall over us with nothing gained, nothing learned.

   After waving off my beloved and curling up fetal style in the sea of striped sheets and pillows I dozed in and out of consciousness for ninety minutes dreaming of worlds and yearnings that no human has before been given nor granted, before finally accepting my fate and pivoting up angrily feeling my heels dropping to the wood beams laid out below. My mind races with a somewhat controlled and confused rage before finally rising and commencing with my days activities.

   Striding slowly to a stop atop the saddle below Tom's Thumb I am devoid of any thoughts of sleeplessness, anxiety, confusion. Instead I am drinking in what comes with the exploration of this world. Granite pillars stand around me like the fair skinned cousins of Stonehenge, gathering together as if spreading gossip or admitting a secret crush to one another. I glance up the ridge to the base of the Thumb to the north following the thin vein of trail that delivers us all to its vantage, catching a family of five all in unison hurriedly scurrying up the well packed path in anticipation of the fruits of their labor.
   Good for them, I bemuse.

   As the parking lot splays itself into view in between each rolling hill on my descent I realize that life is quite simply just that, a series of rolling hills, peaks and valleys, with an intangible reward awaiting those who make it to the other side.

   A new day.