It's 2 in the morning and I own the world

because i can sit on my front steps and no one - not a soul - is passing on the sidewalk or in the street.

because all the raindrops on all the windshields and the pink in the sky from the city lights must be there with my permission because there's simply no one else to have allowed them to be there.

because the idiot drag racing himself towards home in a little pickup wasn't real and i know this because he was simply too absurd and incongruous.

because i hear my own soundtrack in my ears and not another sound.

because i can think of no reason why i couldn't simply walk into the house across the street or the car across the street or the convenience store down the block or the mall half a mile away.

because it's rained and it's sunday night and the world is clean and at peace.

because i can sit in my room with the window open wearing a slip and stockings and be persuasive to no one, and that's freeing. and good for reminding one that one's place in the world is small and insignificant.

because my car doesn't work but i don't care because there's no place open for me to drive it to.

because no one else has presented themselves to claim it.

Looking down the street is shades of grey to black with small points of light and blurred reflection on the wet asphault. Mine and alone, the two lanes divided bordered with sidewalks cease to be a passage for daily motion of anonymous faces, my outside home. It takes a special hour for the city to feel deserted, the changes from day to dark in this small town are dramatic. There is no reason for me to be the only one living in this city, though I am. Each step is for soothing clear and deeper, the complex tangled weight of day to day life lifts off in layers until simply drinking the surroundings swallows all thought. Riding on my bike creaking below me, fingers going cold numb, it would be so nice to share but that would break the feeling. When alone feels perfect, intimate integration with the dark world moving past, it would be possible to dictate any change to reality at will now...yet it is already so very just right.

I'm of the opinion that the hours between midnight and 4 A.M. (see 4AM Syndrome) are the best times to be awake, precisely because no one else is. I just love walking down the middle of the road at night, listening to the sounds of the insects and dogs, as I partake of my nightly Quest To Go Buy Skittles.

It's also cool because you can sit outside and meditate, and there's no one around to disturb you.

And it's also ALSO cool because I live in Sierra Vista, Arizona, and those hours are cool enough to go outside even during the hot summers.

The world is almost surreal at those times, and the atmosphere is very empowering. A group of 5 or 6 friends walking around at this time is even more so. (see: LAN party)

Perhaps I'm going a little too far with this, but perhaps this is an argument for decreased population density- big cities don't quite have the same feel, because there's still traffic at those hours.

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I think I've finally figured it out. It's because at 2 AM, no one is around, so there's no sound. The sun is gone, so there's no light. All that's left is you and the universe. Your senses tune themselves up to compensate, so the lines in the road seem brighter.

Another one of those nights. The incense has gone to my head, amplifying the buzz from my computer by a tenfold. I grab my pack of cloves from the drawer and step outside. The stars are crisp as ever, shining through the trees in my front yard. I am safe here. This is my part of the day, no one elses. I lie down on my driveway and light a clove, staring at the stars. Some Air song floats through my head, clearing it from the noise inside. A walk around the subdivision proves reaffirming to my ownership of this slice of reality.