Chasing the Light
In the Northeast, you grow up praising the arrival of the sun as one worships a god. Except most of us aren’t Greek and we’re pretty sure it didn’t arrive by chariot.
In the spring, we Northerners race around outside chasing down the pools of sun that filter through clouds, and stand like drugged out sunflowers with our goofy grins turned toward the sky.
Summer light has us dancing in the streets. Helios arrives on the scene like Aretha backed up by a Baptist choir. Our days are spent bathing in UV and gratefully accepting whatever body damage comes with.
Autumn sunlight becomes sharp around the edges and scolds us for wasting time, so we run about like ants in a downpour trying to squeeze out every last ray. The fall sun is also a partygoer that doesn’t want to leave, and languishes in the late afternoon, warm and content.
The light of Winter, on the rare days when it’s not bleak and burdened under blankets of clouds, can cut glass and gives the cold its sharp tongue. Like an elderly crossing guard, it is efficient and unthreatening, but you know it when he has something to say.
I was born under a new moon and during a partial solar eclipse. The light and I have been in conversation my entire life. And we have many more things to discuss.
Collectively, we are in a time of restricted light. As autumn draws in and our sunlight wanes, we feel the shift in our bodies. However the light of our awareness has been restricted for some time and is directly impacting our emotional, psychological and spiritual selves. We are left with a sense of confusion, anxiety, panic that override our ability to find joy and be carefree.
I believe this restriction is different than darkness. Darkness is the absence of light. Darkness implies a loss. In darkness, there is a void.
Restricted light means there are constraints keeping us from accessing all light that is possible, like living in a fog bank that seems to never end. We cannot see it, but like infinite potentiality more awaits our ability to unlock it and set it and us free.
Starting life on the 42nd latitudinal line has taught me that there will always be more sun, more brightness for us to access even when things seem dark and thick. There is an eternal source burning within. How can there not be? We are made up of the same materials as the stars. Perhaps that is what this restricted time is trying to teach us: find the light within. Looking outwards, waiting around for the light to come back to us, all the while building our frustration, anxiety and hopelessness is only further restricting our access. Perhaps in all of our expectation, our anger and our judgement we aren’t calling in the light at all. Maybe when we ignore our own light, and the light of others, we are actually calling in the darkness.
The sun doesn’t wait for you to show up.
Just a thought. Here’s some pretty pictures.
