5 AM Cigar

Simple Pleasures...


There's something to be said for the hours between sunset and sunrise--and not all sinister and bad I would like to add.

Over the past ten or fifteen years I've learned to enjoy the evening hours in a manner different from the times when I was locked into a "normal" 24 hour ritual involving work and play and sleep on a regimented schedule.

Today I still find myself living basically two days for every one rotation of the Earth.

Further, I find that if you put yourself into the correct state of mind and the right geographic location that you can gain a great deal of satisfaction from the hours when most of the people on the planet huddle inside their homes in their pajamas.

Of course you don't want to be found wandering the streets of Atlanta or LA at 3 AM unless you are a frivolous drunken club patron, a thief, or some form of Vampire, but I know about a few places which are quite nice at that hour.

Blackwater Sound off Key Largo and a couple of little bays near Upper Matecombe Key in Florida come to mind if you have access to the appropriate boat and don't mind enduring the onslaught of mosquitoes which attack every living thing at sunset each evening.

Then there is the coral beach on the northeast shore of Walker's Cay in the Bahama's which provides a landscape at low tide which is almost Lunar in appearance as the sun rises each morning.

The numerous little un-inhabited islands in the Philippines, viewed from the aircraft elevator portal of a Carrier as they slide by in the twilight manage to get the attention of even the most inattentive young midshipman (that would be me...)

The view over the Marsh looking east from St. Simons Island toward the lights of Sea Island provide an excellent venue for forming early morning thoughts and cogitations.

Then there is the near perfect silence (except for the bugs) found on our front porch here on the banks of the mighty Tennessee River--which is were I'm headed this morning with a book and cigar in hand to contemplate my existence and solve a few world problems.

Wish me luck...if you will...