If I Could Only See

The steering wheel shimmies under my hands as I join the pre-dawn stream of traffic heading down the Swan Road toward the city. I have to pull off as a luxury SUV nearly rams me from behind. I get a flying bird for being a responsible driver who realizes he has a tire rapidly going flat. I get out to examine the situation on the traffic side of the vehicle. Cars whiz by, fifteen, twenty miles over the speed limit. I see a bolt jammed into the tire and hear the hiss of air escaping. I am not going to be able to drive anywhere on this and will have to change my plans for the morning. Email students, call for a tire appointment, re-schedule conferences. Check. Check. The day is painfully lovely, cool, and young. Anything is possible, I believe. But what I see is postponement, extra work, cramped make-up and hair-pulling, hurried catch-up. Breathe. Breathe. It's OK, I say. Even this moment, the one that falls far short of what I had hoped for, is a chance, an opportunity to delight in early morning, a morning that hangs there waiting, un-made, ready for what it is I will imagine of it. It sits there like a present wrapped in sunlight. I touch it and look for a way to open it, open to it. I have the tools I need and spin the crank that lowers the spare, the one that has been there for years, waiting.