The creeping darkness

Well, on the second day of summer I commented on one of my BLOGs about the creeping darkness and that I was noticing that it was already getting darker. Well, tonight, I looked out at 9:00 p.m. and noticed that the swimming pool lights were not on. And why would I notice this? Because it was dark out. The lights at the pool are timed to come on around 9:00 p.m. I panicked and thought that someone had turned off the switch. As I'm pool chair person and in charge (in theory) of the pool workings, I thought I was going to have to go out and get someone to help me turn on the lights. That didn't happen because at precisely 9:01 the lights came on.

Now, normally I wouldn't have noticed because it's not been dark until after 9:00 p.m. and earlier in the summer it didn't get dark until 10:00 p.m. We're on the outer fringe of the eastern time zone and so we have light later in the day. Mornings are darker, but I'm used to that.

However, this morning I noticed that it didn't get light until almost 7:30. Now, for a person who rarely gets out of bed before noon, that's some observation. This morning, however, I was awake at 5:30 and couldn't get back to sleep, so I got up and toasted an English muffin and turned on Fox news, thinking that maybe the McCain campaign has leaked the name of the person who would be the vice presidential candidate for the GOP. Well, that wasn't on the news yet, so I switched over to a movie channel. Nothing there, so I finished knitting one of the scarves I'm making for the granddaughters for Christmas. By then, I was sleepy again and went back to bed. That was around 9:00 a.m. and it was light out. Yeah! I was awakened at 11:00 o'clock by a wrong number. But that was okay. I needed to get up.

Now, the creeping darkness depresses me -- not in a clinical sense, just in a way that I like the light of the sun. I can't really sit out in it any more, those liver spots are spreading like wildfire!

But the darkness that has slowly lengthened throughout the summer has become very noticeable. I suppose if I had grown up in Kenya like my husband, I wouldn't be annoyed by the fluctuating life cycle of sunshine in the area in which I live. In Kenya it is sunny for 12 hours a day. The sun rises at 6:00 a.m. and sets at 6:00 a.m. Kenya is on the equator and they have equal length days all year round. I found that when I was in Kenya that 6:00 pm. LIGHTS OUT time was confusing, but I imagine if I had grown up with that, I would get used to it. It was confusing because the weather said summer, but the LIGHTS OUT said winter.

So, folks, as the darkness creeps upon us and winter approaches, I want you all to know that I'm thankful for the sun we had this summer. I'm thankful that I live on a part of the earth that has seasons, and I'm looking forward to the fall colors, the winter snows, and then the spring, and then the summer sun, and on it goes.

ttfn