5:32 AM – Where the World Feels Like Mine

There’s a kind of magic that lives in the early hours—the kind you have to earn by crawling out of a warm bed before the sun even remembers it has a job to do. It’s quiet here. Not the forced kind of quiet, like holding your breath during a tense conversation, but the kind that hums with promise. The kind that tastes like peace and smells faintly of last night’s rain drying off cracked pavement.

My Keurig hisses like it knows the secret to starting over. My chipped mug waits patiently on the counter, a silent accomplice to all my best thoughts. Coffee isn’t just a drink at this hour—it’s a ritual. It’s the sharp bite of bitter warmth that reminds me I’m alive, that I’ve beaten the world to the punch today. While the rest of them are tangled up in their dreams or their regrets, I’m standing here barefoot on cold kitchen tiles, reclaiming a version of myself that doesn’t have to perform.

Outside, the sky is caught between who it was and who it’s about to become—navy bleeding into soft grey, a hesitant sort of beauty. Even the birds take their time with their first song, like they’re waiting for me to finish this page before they break the spell.

I sit by the window, legs tucked under me, steam curling from the mug like a lazy dancer. There’s no rush. No emails. No questions. No need to smooth my hair or stretch my smile into something palatable. Just me and this moment. Just me and the realization that, for a few rare minutes every day, life feels uncomplicated.

Soon enough, the world will start shouting again—deadlines, dishes, news cycles full of things I can’t control. But right now? Right now, the biggest decision I have to make is whether to pour a second cup. And God, doesn’t that sound like the kind of life we’re all secretly chasing?

Tomorrow, try it. Wake up before the noise. Brew something strong. Watch the sky wrestle itself awake. And when that first sip hits your tongue, remember—you were here before the chaos. You owned the day before anyone else had a say in it.

That’s the kind of power no one talks about.

~smy