Tuesday, 06:15, Innsbruck/Austria
The smell of mountains at dawn: herbal and fresh, laid with aromatics from pine trees and alpine scrub warming up in the sun. The bees are wasting no time, golden scruffs bobbing along the lavender heads. Sparrows and blackbirds make occasional passes over the balcony garden of the hotel I’ve found at this hour to myself. A crow cawing keeps the foreground against swifts screeching out beyond the square in exploratory arcs.
The hush of a distant river of traffic marks my imagined border to the city, separating the urban from wild. Beyond the motorway, hills rise to peaks and mountains, visible beyond the row of apartments backing into the square shared with the hotel. Green rises up into craggy ledges shunted by the adjoining of continents an eon ago; earthen shards thrusting into lofted peaks and cliffs penetrating the atmosphere.
It’s peaceful. A dream I’ve forgotten lifted me out of unconsciousness. The bright first light breaking through the curtains kept me awake. I rolled over and reached over to the floor, finding the time on my phone to be a reasonable hour to rise and steal a few hours to myself. Or, at least, for as many hours as I can refrain from disturbing Steph’s recovery from Glastonbury and our day-long train journey here on Saturday.
These are my golden hours. Golden hours in the day of maximal calmness and quiet; the hours where my energy tends to flows into words most clearly.
I’m joined in the day by who I take to be residents of Innsbruck sleepily making their first moves on the balconies attached to the backs of the apartments. An older woman sweeps her balcony before erecting a red parasol to take a seat under. Someone holding their hair and daylight from sleepy eyes opens a door and looks for something I imagine to be a child’s toy. A bushy-tailed white and black cat patrols briefly before re-entering their lair.
Aromas of pine, lavender and colourful alpine scrub arrive from the slopes in waves mixing with the cooler air in the valley, the warmth of the hotel on my back, and the scent of croissants escaping a window.