I hate getting up early but sometimes it really is worth it. Today was a case in point. Swimming slowly in the silky soft sea, seeing the horizon getting pinker by the minute, and finally the moment when the sun popped up, in its dazzling glory, above the Imperial Hotel. We were in Torquay, by the Hindu Temples caves, which get miraculously lit up in the morning sunlight. Jackie was swimming with a waterproof bag, in which she had secreted a breakfast 'starter' of cream cheese and smoked salmon, which we ate on a sun-drenched rock in front of the caves. We swam around for a while afterwards, revelling in the magical dawn, and then repaired for a cooked breakfast on the sandstone headland.
Watching the sun rise is both magical and therapeutic. You are drenched in beauty, and the inevitability of the sun rising and setting every day, whatever happens in our little lives, somehow puts things in perspective. A couple of months ago I got up early to watch the sun rise on Dartmoor; it's something I've been doing on the anniversary of my mother's death for a few years, and now of course I've lost Felix it is even more important I do it, as a little act of remembrance and worship. Then a few weeks ago I went for an early morning swim with Amanda in Torquay (ok it wasn't dawn, we were a bit too tired for that) but there was such a sense of serenity out there, it was quiet and otherworldly and the sea held us in its gentle grasp.
