Why the tap was running

Feet on the floor. Bathroom door shut. Tap running, and not for washing. If that was your morning, the next part was muscle memory. Clearing the night out of your chest while the water covered the sound. Some days it took a minute. Some days it was the loudest thing in the house.

That cough was overtime. Your chest is built to clear itself while you sleep. Irritate it all day and the night's work backs up until morning, when you finish it by hand, bent over the sink. The cigarette billed you the first minutes of every day and called it waking up.

As your chest settles, those minutes can empty out. Some mornings may still bring a little cleanup. Let them. Then one day you wake up, get up, and the day starts on the first try. Nothing to hide under running water. It's such an ordinary quiet that it slides right past you. Some of God's best gifts arrive as something that stops happening.

Tomorrow, give the first thirty seconds after you wake to listening. Hear the nothing. Let your first words of the day go up before your feet go down. Thank You for every quiet start. Mornings used to begin at the sink with the water running. More and more, they just begin.