Saturday, June 26, 2010

The light of this and other days


For about as far back as the writ of memory reliably runs—in my case probably late in 1956—I have felt myself oppressed by the light of mid-morning, which first burned my emotional emulsions in the parched LA suburbs of my early childhood. For quite as long, I have basked and gloried in the slanted sunlight of late afternoon. I thought of this today as I strolled to the corner store (a 55,000 square foot Whole Foods Market on the edge of downtown Oakland, lest anyone imagine I'm speaking of a tiny mom&pop grocer) in the golden rays of a Northern California early summer.

Through my undergraduate years autumn was my favorite season, but in the years since, as the brute requirements of earning a livelihood have kept me indoors for most of the daylight hours, my preference has shifted toward summer, and Daylight Savings Time: I adore the illusion of a life after work. Since the beginning of the last decade I note a shift in my emotional response to the solstice from "Hot damn! Summer again!" to a pensive "I wonder how many more of these are left in the jar?"

It's good to be alive this late afternoon.

1 comment:

Richard Careaga said...

We call this "Stockholm light," which bathed that city when we visited in late summer.