I have always loved the early morning. Being a farm kid, I started early life as a "get up and do the chores before school" routine, carried it out after I went into the Navy, cause you sure do not sleep late on board ship.
It prepared me for a traveling life in music, where you would watch the sun come up, blinding in it's brightness, after you had driven all night to get to the next gig. The morning sun was always welcome, after the night time drive, because it would give you a charge of energy, and the daytime never seems as lonesome as the darkness of night.
I have many memories of spectacular sunrises, in the middle of the Pacific Ocean, on board ship, when you have the Midnight to four o'clock watch, and the sky starts brightening, and after your watch, you just stay up awhile to watch it blaze across the water.
Driving across the dessert, and the colors of a new day is just breathtaking.
I would always pull over and stop to enjoy the beauty, crack open the thermos and have a fresh cup of coffee, maybe thinking of a new song running through my mind.
Morning is always a creative time for me, being a morning person, I awake instantly, and am up and fully awake most times even before the first cup of Joe. It's when the mind is fresh, rested and active.
In 1964, having been in Nashville for two years, I landed an early morning television show vocalist position. I got up at three o'clock, five days a week, was at the tv station by 5 to rehearse, went on the air, live, at 6 and sang my songs til 8. That schedule suited me well, since I already had developed the early morning lifestyle, from the farm and the Navy. I stayed with that show from 1964 until 1967, moving to the first "Stan Hitchcock Show", a weekly syndicated show, that gave me a nationwide audience and cemented my career in television from that time on.
My favorite morning times is getting up before light, hooking up my boat and being on the water as the first light breaks. It is the most peaceful time to be on the water, where the water is almost still as glass, and the wonders of nature are just awesome.
I was up at 4 this morning, restless with my mind full of challenges to be dealt with, a sense of time slipping away from me. I suppose that is a common feeling for an old road runner....so many places to see, so little time. Walked down and watched my horses eating the new grass, as the sun was coming up, and it settled me right down, as it always does.
A life is more than time and a clock ticking. A day is to be savored, tasted and enjoyed. I must not rush through the day, to quickly, take my time, look carefully, you don't want to miss something good because you were in too big a hurry, and you go right on by it.
So, the fog is lifting over the creek, one by one the birds are waking to sing a new song. The gentle breeze is just tickling the new leaves of Spring. Old Buck The Collie, sound asleep after a night of guard duty, his left leg, twitching, as if he were running in his dreams, chasing the deer from the yard grass, steadfast in his head of security position, even in deep sleep.
Lord, thank you for another day of my life. I pray you will use me, today, for good. Give me a spirit of encouragement, a renewing of Faith and the Strength to face, whatever comes my way today.
Stan
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