I don’t remember being this excited about driving through fog. The entire state is pretty much flush with the ocean, and it’s as if the clouds settle down upon the sea and peninsula, and they’re still asleep as some of us rise from our slumbers around 6am. We drive through the mist. Our commute parallels the state of our brains that early in the morning.

It’s a patchy fog, which means we get moments of clarity among stretches of translucence. The car’s headlights call out these early morning spirits, amorphous beings, gossamer souls who only evaporate as the dawn breaks.

Going north from Green Cove Springs on Highway 17, I cross a bridge over Black Creek. The dew point is no match for the water’s temperature, and maybe the span of the creek instantly dissolves the fog that tried resting on the glassy surface. The creek clears out a vista to the east, where the sun slowly unseals itself from some low clouds on the horizon.

I see it now; this morning belongs to me. I emerge from the hour, the fog, the eerie whispers. I settle into the heat, the humidity; and the sun begins its arc through the day. I am not melting. I won’t disappear.