It's So Dark

Monday, Wednesday, and Friday, we get up at 6:30 a.m. to head downstairs to our home gym (aka the sports memorabilia, grandkids play area, pool table room.) It's the only place that has enough space for two oversized yoga mats, assorted dumbbells, a medicine ball, and furniture slides (how else are you supposed to do the body saws?) We fire up the laptop, enter Zoom-world, and work out with our trainer for an hour. And I am always glad I do it because I feel so much better afterward.

But this morning, it was dark. Really dark.

I don't know about you, but waking up when it's still dark outside is a significant obstacle to actually getting out of bed. The birds aren’t even up yet! This morning it was even tougher to jump up. Steady rain added to the gloom. The covers were warm. But the alarm was insistent. I glared at it. It wouldn’t go away. With a sigh, I rolled out of bed, into my workout clothes, and made my way down the steps. Carefully, slowly, quietly. Managing to carry the laptop, my phone, and a bottle of water.

Now I know what you’re thinking. “You live in Northeastern Pennsylvania! It gets darker this time of the year every year!” Yes, I know. You don’t have to go into the full axis-of-the-earth-relative-to-the-sun explanation. I get it, I get it. It makes no difference to me. All I do know is we are heading into the "greys," the time of year when, even if the sun does rise, the overwhelming color of the sky is grey - sometime dark suit grey, sometime pale linen grey. But grey nonetheless. Almost every day. You might be able to see a wisp of a cloud, at other times they are dark and stormy. Those of us who much prefer summer to winter hunker down and hibernate. We secretly open next year’s calendar to see when Memorial Day falls – the official start of summer – and draw stars on the date.

This year more than any other, the darker days of winter are going to be tough. (Who am I kidding – this whole year has been challenging for everyone in so many ways… as one meme I saw online put it – The Year 2020 – ½ star review – would not recommend.) The holidays will be different. Shipageddon! BOPIS! Black Friday sales are starting now! Figuring out if traveling interstate will require a quarantine. Wanting to see family and wanting to keep them safe. But we will see it through.

You see, there's a significant day in December. No, not Christmas. Monday, December 21st. The winter solstice. From then on, the hours of daylight get longer, little by little, but longer each day. Just knowing that fact helps me get through January – the longest, bleakest month of them all. I know it has thirty-one days like many other months, but those thirty-one have none of the excitement of anticipating the holidays or feeling that we’ve turned the corner towards spring. (And all you winter sports enthusiast, don’t bother to leave a comment as it will fall on deaf ears. Sorry.)

Until then, I’m going to do my best to ignore the darkness in the morning. I’ll cheerily great our trainer with a “Peachy keen!” when he asks how we’re feeling and remember that he has already done a session at 5:45 a.m.!

And hey! We get to fall back this weekend! An extra hour to sleep in and dream of a summer morning when the sun has gotten up before have. When the coming warmth of the day is encouragement to hop out of bed. And when blue skies and puffy white clouds are a great start to the day.