A Morning In Winter

The morning stole quietly across my sill as I lay, sound asleep, deep in layers of warmth against the predawn cold. Beside me was a warm soft ball, rumbling quietly beneath the covers and at my feet was another warm ball pushed hard and noiseless against my soles. There was no other sound as I stirred in my sleep, disturbing feline and canine bodies just a little. I am so used to them sharing my bed, I compensate and restrict my movements so as not to wake them, as waking means a throwing on of robes in order to brave the chill and let them out into the garden where they attend to morning matters. It was as I turned that I first heard the sleepy carol of a waking magpie and was instantly transported fifty-five years back in time to another world where I was a child rousing in a country bed far away, to the same sound of carolling maggies. My still sleepbound mind scented the air and smelled bush smoke...eucalypt burning hot and hasty in a wood fuelled stove, preparing for the breakfast rush. That would be my Auntie Bunny, alone in the kitchen still, getting Uncle Tom's food ready for his long day in the market gardens of the Manchester Unity in Woodend. Sigh.

My magpie this morning waited awhile longer before carolling again and rousing his mates for another day of foraging for feed in the cold winter dawn. I wondered if stirring insects, worms and lizards, also heard the carolling, knowing this might be their day to feed a hungry mouth or two. My bed was still. I could roll over and return to the dreams I had so very nearly left behind. The maggie's sweet sound faded as once again I fell asleep, the sun still an hour away from waking too.