Wake up call

Buddy has a job, and he performs it faithfully.
Starting at around 4:30am, he rises and stretches his neck, and reaches deep down for a crow that bellows out over the garden and meadow and pond beyond.

Again at 5:30, once more at 6 ish--just to be sure we got the message. I turn over, twice, sound weaving in and out of my dream, first a car horn, next a saxophone. I'm on a gondola and there's music wafting from the shore. I squint my eyes open to see the morning. Prayer flags hanging in the trees wave in the heavy, cool summer morning air. I think they rustled a little from the boom of Buddy's call. I roll over one more time and then...crooowwwww! (Or in french: cocoRIco...cocoRIco". I like this better than cockadoodle doo. It doesn't sound anything like cockadoodle doo!)

"Alright already! I'm up." This is starting to feel personal.

I rouse myself and shuffle over to a chair by the window for morning meditation. Time to listen. The still small voice inside calls..."cocoRico." but more like a whisper, gently nudging me into consciousness, inviting me into the day, into my life.

It is said that soon after his enlightenment the Buddha passed a man on the road who was struck by the Buddha's extraordinary radiance and peaceful presence. The man stopped and asked, “My friend, what are you? Are you a celestial being or a god? “

“No,” said the Buddha. “

“Well, then, are you some kind of magician or wizard?”

Again the Buddha answered “No.”

“Are you a man?”

“No.”

“Well, my friend, then what are you?”

The Buddha replied, “I am awake.”

May I be a little more awake today, and a little more grateful for the rooster.