Look, up in the sky

 

Late this afternoon, a storm swept across my hometown.

Big storm. Driving rain. Lightning. Thunder. The whole buckets of water blowing sideways display.

Barely three hours later, clear skies greeting you if you stepped outside to look at a few stars.

Things seem to change in an instant.

I like to take a few moments each evening to walk around my backyard, or even just sit down for a bit. Always have. There’s something peaceful about shutting off the lights, perhaps grabbing a drink, and stepping outside to gaze into the infinity of the nighttime heavens. Something I find brilliant and awesome, and yet at the same time intimate and comforting.

But that’s not to say I need clear skies and the overnight to enjoy the world around me.

We’ve all played the games with clouds and shapes. That one’s a face… that one a turtle.

And there’s something to be said for watching clouds race… not move across the sky, but move with great speed… clouds race above.

One of the things that always occurs to me is the flip between day and night. I find it stunning how things are so exposed around us during the day, and concealed by the darkness of night. Why stunning? Because as the world nearby is hidden, the universe opens up.

Not everything is exposed by the daylight. Not everything covered by the night.

I’ve tried to see where such a duality, such a flip, takes place elsewhere. There aren’t a lot of options.

Some would say people can be. The public persona as opposed to the private. Others might bring up religion and philosophy, or opposites such as good and evil, sweet and sour, heaven and hell.

But none of those work as well. Those are creations of opposition. Of balance. I’m not looking toward the flip of day to night.

If I walk across my yard during the day, there are shrubs and fences. There’s a table and chairs. There’s a shed. All of those items from the day are still in place during the night, with possible addition of the raccoon trying to sort out a meal from a birdfeeder being an exception. There is no change to the design.

The same holds true up above. Those stars and planets and galaxies and more are there all the time. They don’t go away. They’re just obscured by the light.

Obscured by the light. Exposed by the dark. A true flip of thought from the way we normally think of things, and yet not a change of any composition.

Makes you think.

 

If you have any comments or questions, please e-mail me at Bob@inmybackpack.com