Our Trip around the sun

OK—this is a new insight that I am just realizing that you may also enjoy. It’s exciting to me because it’s something about huge planetary relationships that I can grasp on a human scale. It’s a combination of things we know with things we can imagine. See if this makes sense (or if it's even true).

How do we get from the shortest day of the year to the longest? It depends on where we live in relation to the poles and the equator.


Imagine tossing a ball into the air. When it reaches the top of its arc, you can imagine that it’s momentarily motionless. That’s like the Earth at the edges of the ellipse in its orbit. Those are the Solstices—that sense of suspension when the sunrise and sunset times flatten out for days or weeks at a time depending on your latitude—before opening up to earlier sunrises and later sunsets.

If you live at the Equator, you don’t need to toss the ball very far as your daylight doesn’t fluctuate so much throughout the year. Live at the poles where the sun doesn’t rise or set at the extreme arcs? You’d have to throw the ball so hard it would disappear for a moment.

Most of us are grateful for every little bit of increasing light we get these days. And right now – in the Northern Hemisphere, those of us further North have more darkness everyday than those of us living closer to the Equator- BUT!!! BIG CONSOLATION PRIZE. The Northern days are getting lighter much faster- by minutes per day (Iceland) instead of a few seconds per day (Malaysia).

This seemed like cheerful news and worth sharing.