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2 A.M. Walks Kept Me Sane in a Soulless 9–5
The world changes at 2 a.m.
The world changes at 2 a.m.
There are fewer people and less noise. The light is different. Most buildings shut down their garish bulbs, and hazy street lamps stand out more.
In a small, mountain town like mine, the streets turn foggy in the early hours. The air changes. It’s cooler, fresher. Surrounded by pines and silent buildings, I discover the scent of greens, of leaves and trees that urban life obscured during the day. Now and then, I walk down an alley and I smell it before I see it: a sweet, perfume-like fragrance. Angel’s trumpets bloom only at night.
In those days, my “9–5” started at 8 p.m. and ended at 5 a.m. I was a call center agent. Based in the Philippines, my work revolved around booking hotel rooms for Americans who are just waking up on the other side of the world. The rooms they book average $150 a night, with the cheaper ones being in the $80 to $95 range. Others stayed in $200-$400 rooms and those on vacation spent as much as $500 a night. I got paid roughly $260 per month to do that job; planning escapades I could never afford.
So I looked forward to two things: the end of my shift, and the one-hour, unpaid lunch break, that I took at 2 a.m.
