Tag Archives: winter solstice

Weather

Complicated Relationship

43 Comments

Yesterday was the day of the annual Winter Solstice.  From now on the days slowly lengthen – until they begin to shrink again.  This on-again, off-again type of relationship has led to many angry/needy notes like the one I’ve just written to The Sun.  

 

So I get this feeling that things are warming up again between us.

Am I wrong? I don’t think so. You’re coming back, aren’t you?

Well don’t.

And don’t say you haven’t changed. Change is all I get from you. Last summer … well let’s just say June 15 was pretty special. Not going to forget that soon.

But I can’t count on you. Just weeks before that I felt so frozen and hurt.   You could have warmed me then but where were you? Behind a cloud all day? What does that even mean?   In what kind of relationship do you get to do that and it’s OK?

And it’s like this every year. You get closer and the intensity is overwhelming.  Then you fade. It’s like I hardly see you. And then it seems like you’re hanging around a few more minutes each day until you’re always here and I can’t get any sleep because there is So Much You.

And as soon as I start basking in that, I can sense you turning away.

This is getting old. Like billions of years old.   Make up your mind – do you want to be close or distant?

And don’t say I’m the one who’s all tilted and elliptical and orbity.   That’s a cop-out. I know for a fact that you wobble. And I don’t think it’s me that makes you do it.

I turn to you every day and some days you are just not available. But still I turn to you again the next day and the next so tell me who’s steady and reliable.

When it comes to temperament, only one of us has spots. Only one of us has flares. And only one of us can give the other one a stroke.

So now you’re coming back and I’m supposed to be all happy but get over yourself because I already know how this turns out.   So don’t waste your time and mine trying to heat things up if you’re just going to leave again in six months.

I can live without you … Is a lie that I tell myself every year. But this time around I am not going to get burned by you.  I bought a hat.

How do I look?

Your forever,
I’m Still Angry

So what’s up with you and the sun?   

 

The Baboon Congress

Darkness, Darkness

64 Comments

Today’s guest post comes from Barbara in Robbinsdale.

A couple of times a year, the sun comes in my south facing bedroom window at just the right angle to warm my face while waking me up.

Sunlight!

This morning being a “day off” in the midst of the merry-go-round that is December, I let myself stay in bed – watch the designs on the insides of my eyelids, and let my mind drift. This kind of quiet time happens so rarely, and I encountered this perception: Here I am, one of billions of humans who, at some point today, will get up while my side of earth is facing the sun, basking in its light and warmth. We will run around and do stuff for roughly two-thirds of this rotation. Then, while our side of the earth slips into darkness, we’ll lie down for roughly the remaining one-third of it, to “re-charge the batteries” while asleep. We will all get up tomorrow and do it again, for probably thousands of more times.

But ironically, right now we get sunlight for only one-thirdof the spin, which means we spend about eight of our waking hours in (relative) darkness, too. (This would have been much more noticeable before all the electric lights.)

Fireplace, sort of

This year I decided to do something about all this dark in my environment – I asked for, and have received, one of those cute little heaters disguised as a fireplace. I usually don’t like fake things, but this is close enough to a real-looking fireplace, that it’s helping me with winter’s cold and the dark. I’ll find myself edging closer to as I’m reading. (Now I just need a fireplace sound-track.)

Luckily, this being the end of December, we’re at the turn-around point. But it will be a while till we’re out of the long, dark nights.

How do you cope with the shortest days of the year?