Rush hour on the sidewalk.

One of my favorite indulgences is an hour plus walk early Saturday morning before the family stirs. In the winter, I watch the sun rise in solitary peace. In the summer, I bump elbows with runners, bikers, dog walkers, jogging strollers, and phone-chatters as the sidewalks around Dunwoody Village fill with neighbors enjoying the morning cool. (Why do people walk and talk on the cell phone at the same time? Don't they WANT to disconnect from busy-ness?)

My dog longed to meet two stately chocolate labs who walked shoulder to shoulder next to their owner. We met them twice; I crossed the road to avoid a mix-up the first time; the owner stepped kindly into a yard the second. His dogs were much better behaved than Scooter the Wonder Dog.

Two neighbors ran past me on the last leg home. We have a meeting this afternoon to discuss our pending litigation about the daycare center going in behind us, so we called a greeting and a reminder to each other.

There's a stretch of sidewalk on Womack, near the library, that's so overgrown that the sidewalk is half its normal width. Of course, that's invariably where several of us will need to pass each other. Two runners jumped into the lane of traffic to go around me and the dog. I stopped and stepped back into the overgrowth to let a stroller pass by. I thought that if we were all in cars, there might have been much less "after you" and more "get out of my way."

When the light changed at the intersection of Chamblee-Dunwoody and Mt. Vernon Road, I had the pedestrian go-ahead to cross. I stepped into the crosswalk, then had to stop when a car came from behind and darted left in front of me. Hmmm . . . pretty sure that was both rude and illegal. But it happens nearly every time I walk, so I'm careful.

The outdoor seating at Starbucks was filled with guys in baseball caps, gals in pony tails chatting before their tennis game (I'm not a mindreader - they were wearing really cute tennis outfits), and several reading the morning paper. I love the smell of coffee that wafts from the shop.

The Fresh Market had a great display of seasonal fruits outside; soon, their grill will join the one at Publix to fill the air with roasting meat. Add the smokey barbecue coming from Olde Hickory House, and it's hard to fight the temptation to fire up the grill at home.

It's Saturday morning in Dunwoody. What a wonderful start to the day.