At 5:15 Sunday morning if you’re in the park with kids you aren’t checking out the elements, you’re part of them. Among the limping and squinty-eyed, beneath the birds who are still waiting to sing. There are those here who slept in their cars for the night, some who haven’t slept at all, and one motivated soul who went to bed early so he wouldn’t miss his A.M. jog. That guy is a jerk and the birds are cruel.

We are part of this. At Haggens Grocery (open 24 hours) humanity at 5:15 consists of the half-alive, half-dead, and half-stocking shelves. The airport and sketchy gas station are the only other things open. Everyone here didn’t start at the same time but we’re now all part of this collective grave-yard shift, searching for brown rice on aisle 5 and our brain in the deli. The meat and cheeses are not out yet and the newspaper is undelivered, but the bagels just arrived to warm the slumbering hearts of the freaks and phantoms.

And it’s early when you go back to the park to see the sun still only hitting the tops of the fir trees. Below, in the big shadow, lurks us.