At the dawning of the day

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I did it! - Writing at dawn – well 5.00am to be precise before the dawn broke - “Hemingway time” and on the occasion of my birthday (there were other celebrations too you’ll be pleased to hear). The 5.00am write, this was my challenge (see earlier blog 28.08.09) as a result of a provocative thought prompted by a fellow blogger.

And what was that like?

I was so concerned about not sleeping in; my internal alarm system jolted me awake at 4.45am. I guess that was my subconscious still coming to terms with the shock of a 5.00am start and the fact that I had chosen, yes, chosen of my own free will to do this. No early morning flight, no sponsored sunrise walk, no early morning business breakfast – quite simply a choice to get up and write at 5.00am.

Armed with a cup of coffee, pen and paper, I wrote and wrote and wrote about everything and anything, whatever flowed from my pen. Believe it or not, I managed to fill 10 pages of A4 (potential material for one or two blogs?). For me, there’s something quite freeing about ‘just writing’ without comments, without checking to see if you’ve spelled words correctly, without checking that the commas are in the right places, without wondering if readers will understand what you’re trying to say, without caring if you as the writer will make sense of it all in a few days time.

It was fine, it was fun, it was free flowing and I liked that. I learned a little more about me in the process too about how I think, what motivates me, what is important, how when I commit to doing something I do it. I found the early morning writing process very therapeutic and the writing tapped into memories I had almost forgotten.

Watching the dawn break and seeing the ‘gum tree’ in the garden silhouetted against the sky was a beautiful picture from Mother Nature. The stillness and sense of peace in the last morning of the summer was something quite special.

Would I repeat the experiment again? Yes, most definitely although I am wondering if perhaps I should keep it as a birthday treat from me to me!