The dark side of light
Cheryl Unruh
Tuesday, December 5, 2006
There’s a rumor that the sun is loitering in a Dunkin’ Donuts store somewhere in Oklahoma.
This is not true. The sun is still working — it’s just been temporarily outsourced to the Southern Hemisphere.
Yes, these days the sun is shining on tourists at Machu Picchu. In Argentina, it is busy growing soybeans, and in Australia, tanning the backs of surfers.
The sun is warming waters off Cape Horn and highlighting the hair of a girl jumping rope in Zimbabwe. It is bringing a temperature of 50 degrees to the Falkland Islands.
But because the sun’s energy is focused on the bottom half of the world, there’s just not much sunshine for us here in the north. All we get are the leftover rays — which are lukewarm, at best.
During the summer, the sun was our constant companion. It put the red in our cheeks and the red in our tomatoes.
The sun rose in the east and disappeared at night along the western horizon. Now we have to look to the southeast to find the sunrise.
During the day, the sun roams across the southern sky, and in the evening it drops out of sight somewhere around… well if I had to guess, I’d say right around Newton.
Ten feet south of my driveway is the neighbor’s big maple tree. In the summer, I can’t buy shade from this tree and my car gets cooked by the August sun.
Now, even though it’s leafless, the neighbor’s maple casts all kinds of shadows over my car and the driveway. As if shade matters now.
This winter light is what painters and photographers love, the hard, bright light that defines objects. Sunlight comes in at a sharp angle and rays skip across the prairie like thrown rocks skip across a lake.
In the summer we had 15 hours of sunlight, but as we approach the winter solstice, our daily allotment is down to about nine and a half.
We’re squeezing our lives into a few hours of daylight. It’s as if all of humanity is being pushed onto a smaller and smaller piece of land. Darkness crowds us into an 8-to-5 time slot. And minutes are still being cut off at both ends of the day.
We learn to live with the darkened hours. I gave up on evenings when Central Standard Time took over. Daylight Saving Time is packed away in the closet along with the shorts and the sandals.
Now that it’s winter, I have little desire to go outside after dark. I usually garage my car at 5 p.m. and stay home, safe and warm, in my little bungalow cave.
It’s not just the seasons and the resulting tilt of the sun that make winter short on quality light. Also working against us light fanatics is another form of darkness — the hopeless gray clouds that block the sun for days on end.
Sometimes overhead, we don’t have a mere blanket of clouds — there’s a whole dang mattress in the sky. And there’s no way light is going to sneak through that.
Those clouds just settle in tight, like a blindfold over the state, and keep us from seeing our baby blue skies.
Meanwhile, down south, the Tropic of Capricorn has captured the sun, hoarding all of that delicious Vitamin D.
The winter solstice will turn things around though. And that’s a good thing for us light groupies and those who have a fear of rickets.
Between December 22 and June 21, each day grows little bit longer, a little bit brighter.
So hang on, dear ones, when the sun’s through dancing on the streets of Rio, it’s going to head north again. It will return.
I just hope it doesn’t stop for doughnuts along the way.
“Flyover People” is online at www.flyoverpeople.net.
F Cheryl Unruh can be reached at cheryl@flyoverpeople.net.
Flips (anonymous) says...
What a great story----- I love Cheryl's writing but this was a really good one-------kept me laughing!!!!!!!!!
Thanks for the sun & the donut & a good laugh!!!!!
December 5, 2006 at 4:10 p.m. ( permalink | suggest removal )