Davids Mantra

I have a friend in Ghana and his name is David. He is a soft soul, easy to be around, someone who makes life feel fluffy and free. He lives in the village and was hired on as administrative staff at the Huttel Health Center during my second stay. I used to wake up early in the morning (my room was in the birth center), before any patients had arrived, before any of the nurses began work, and spend a peaceful hour in the waiting room doing yoga, looking through the screen walls at the thick crops and mango trees just outside. Mid-session David would ride up on his bike, smiling from ear-to-ear, park, jump off, and mosey over.
"Gooood mooooorning..." He'd whisper, and walk away.
I loved these mornings, mostly, because I was falling in love with a new part of life.
I have never been a morning person, or so that is what I believed. But heat penetrated the village, intensely, by 9:00 a.m. and I had to change my ways. I had to wake up.
Now I must admit. I have always secretly admired morning people, I think all night owls do. I have always felt they held a special exuberance, deeper insight, greater peace, but I figured losing the extra hours of sleep in the morning was just not worth it so I passed it off as an annoying perkiness.
Environmental factors soon forced me to change my ways. Each morning, gentle waves of heat began to layer upon me, coaxing me to leave my sweat soaked sheets and buck up, to try something new.
At first, it was enough to just be upright by 6 a.m.
That, to me, was a major success.
Villagers are morning people. And the type of morning where nature is still quiet and the sun has not risen. Deep morning. What I would argue to be, night.
"You sleep too much!" They'd say.
"What do you mean?"
"I came to your room yesterday, to say hello, and you did not answer. You were sleeping! Ah Akua, by that time, the morning was gone. It was 7 already. Why do you sleep like you are a lazy baby?"
So I began my new habit. I began early rising. And friends started to visit. And I hated it.
I hated having to talk, to think, to form words and sentences and make actual conversation. I found when I did yoga, people would leave me alone, confer with one another that I was doing my "exercise" and should not be bothered, and continue walking home with that mornings enormous harvest balancing on top of their heads. But David was different.
"Goooood mooooooorning..." He would whisper, again, the next day and the one after. A two-word offering, never expecting much in return.
His daily salutation brought me a lot of joy. I would internalize it, the sweet hum of his voice, and repeat it over and over. I would move through my poses, breathing and arching and bending and reflecting: I am awake... and alive... and this IS a good morning. I am awake... and alive... and this is a GOOD morning. I am awake... and alive... and this is a good MORNING?!
The world has a lot to offer at 6 a.m. that can not be had at 9 a.m., bits of passing existence that feed the soul. Like mist, and children running by with buckets to fetch water for their daily bath before school.
David became a conduit, a sage, speaking truth and simplicity in to each of my days through something potentially mundane as a greeting. I usually only offered him a faint smile back, or a little 'hi', or a wave of my fingertips. And he would walk away happily, undoubtedly unaware of the soft impression he had just made.