I hardly get to see the sunrise. It’s usually still pitch black when I get to work at the lovely time of 5:40 am.

But for a few weeks in summer, the sun decides to wake up just a bit earlier.

As I left for work the other morning, indigo tints of sky gently caressed the tops of the mountains, like a mother stroking her sleeping child’s face. It was a glorious June dawn that smelled and sounded of summer. For the first time this year, the early bird made its singing debut before I set off into the world.

It brought me to another time and place for just a minute. Back in time when there was nothing here but unadulterated landscape—no big cities, no freeways, no pollution or smog. And it was beautiful.

What a reminder though how easy it is to forget the beauty that surrounds us. So often the drudgeries of life act as a veil of pollution, covering our eyes, so that instead of seeing beauty, we look at the world through smog and fog-colored glasses.

Instead of appreciating the sunrise, we anticipate the sunset. Instead of being thankful for the coming of dawn, we complain about the dullness of life’s everyday routine, the list of endless to-dos. Instead of being content, we groan and moan about work and school and whatever else we need to get done.

Instead of being present in the present, we wish life would hurry and take us to a future time and place, to “better days.”

But maybe instead of anticipating “better days,” we should take the time to enjoy this moment. Because this moment is fleeting; it will never come again. Things continuously change, and we’ll never live today over again.

So be present in today. Take off the veil of pollution and take a moment to enjoy the beauty surrounding us that we so often take for granted.

It’s beautiful.