5:12

Since March 15, 2018 I wake up every morning at five twelve. Not at five, not at half past five, at five twelve, I checked this over several weeks, put my phone on the bedside table and looked at it every time I woke up, and it was every time between five ten and five fourteen, usually exactly twelve. My alarm used to ring at five fifteen, for thirty years, so apparently the body can remember not just the time but also whether it makes sense, it woke me three minutes early so I wouldn't be startled, that's how I explain it to myself anyway.

The strange thing is that I'm not tired then. I get up, go to the kitchen, make coffee, and sit at the table and look out at the street. At that hour it's quiet. In winter it's still dark, in summer already light, but the quiet is always the same, and I've noticed that I actually like this hour, more than any other hour of the day. What I do with it is another question. Usually nothing at all. Sometimes I write, like now, but that's new. Before, I left the house at quarter past five, took the bus, was at the depot by six. Now I sit at the table and the coffee goes cold because I forget to drink it. Gerda wouldn't have understood that. She always slept until eight when she could, and never grasped why anyone would get up earlier than necessary. I could never explain it to her, that's perhaps the one thing where we were genuinely different.

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