Thomas Doty – Storyteller

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Just Before Sunrise

January morning just before sunrise, rooftops across Ashland are shaggy with frost. Parked cars glitter, streets glitter, and freezing ground fog crawls along the creek.

Before sunrise the sounds of Ashland are crisp: the barking of neighborhood dogs as the last raccoons amble into their burrows toward sleep, the snap of starting cars and scraping of frosty windows, the slap of the newspaper box on the corner.

Just before sunrise, the 6:20 train thunders through town and I know there's 40 more minutes -- 40 long winter minutes -- before the first pale colors of the January sun start warming the day.

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