The dark comes early. At first, I fought it. Disoriented, dazed. And doesn’t it feel like midnight, the moon pooling on the ocean, spilt milk reaching for the shore? At least the clock in the stove, the one I cannot figure out how to reset, is right again.
I have a friend who loves the dark of winter. I used to think she was insane, the way she pined for short days on a long summer night. She craved the cool, the dark, as though a primal part of her wanted to hunker down and hibernate.
Too much else is going on now; I can’t find the energy to resist winter. (Fight Mother Nature, you’ll never win.) The dark doesn’t bother me, I am adapting. This fall, there is a strange energy running through me. Perhaps it is a way of rebelling against the sun receding before I end the work day, but for the first time in my life, I want to stay up late. I want to see the stars, glittering against the deep black of night. I want to make up for lost time.
We’ve gone weeks without rain. I heard the pine trees on Milestone Road are looking thin and scrawny. Scallopers are only getting $12 per pound for their catch. Signs everywhere call out: closed for the season, see you in April. The wind, as always, is unrelenting.
Melville’s Ishmael spoke of damp, drizzly Novembers in his soul, and heading to the sea for solace. What I wouldn’t give for it to be a little drizzly in this drought! Heeding his advice, I followed along the road’s shoulder, snaking further south towards the ocean. Most houses along this path are empty now, the few still occupied smell of woodsmoke. The early dark lends itself to thoughts of the spooky. I do not believe in ghosts but I do believe there are things we can’t quite hear unless we listen closely. This is a quiet season, and I’m keeping my ears open.
On Surfside Road, a car slowed to a crawl. A woman in the passenger’s seat was illuminated by orange high pressure sodium street lamps, only to slip into the darkness once again. A deer in a stupor stumbled out into the middle of the street. The drunks of summer are gone, but the deer are emboldened.
Nantucket at night is another world, one where the crashing waves at Surfside Beach are the loudest sounds. There were trucks in the parking lot, headlights focused on the shoreline. I guess there are other people on this island also unable to sleep. After the last boat leaves, there is nowhere to go but the edges of this place. We are trapped, shipwrecked, lucky.
In the dark, the smell of salt was strong. I stood on the shoreline and could not see the ocean, but could feel it. Walking home, a few barely there drops of rain fell, splattering onto my face.
There will be less daylight tomorrow than today. But the sun will rise all the same. Maybe, if we are lucky, it will even rain.
