The longest night

Woman Reading by Lamplight

Delphin Enjolras

The sun set at 4:18 yesterday and the length of day is now about 8 hours.  "Daylight" is relative, because this includes the murky twilight that begins around 3 pm.  We complained about the cold last week in Seattle but were spoiled by that string of sunny days.  We are reminded just how dark it is in December. I watched the waxing gibbous moon rise each clear night out on the deck, but we won't see the full moon. The weather is milder now, but wet and cloudy.

The world is getting close to the Winter Solstice. For all of Earth's creatures, from squirrels and birds to bears and humans, nothing is more fundamental than the length of day. Unlike the wild creatures, we have a warm, cheery house, good food and wine.

The solstice happens at the same instant, everywhere on Earth. In 2014, the December solstice comes on the 21st at 5:03 p.m.  That’s 23:03 Universal Time. This is when the sun reaches its farthest southward point for the year and the Northern Hemisphere has its shortest day and longest night of the year.

Today is the birthday of the Pre-Raphaelite poet Christina Rossetti.  The lines of this poem she wrote are now a well-known Christmas carol:

In the bleak mid-winter
Frosty wind made moan,
Earth stood hard as iron,
Water like a stone;
Snow had fallen, snow on snow,
Snow on snow,
In the bleak mid-winter
Long ago.