Enlightened Times?
Leve ignatius hyem
One aspect of life that we share with the natural world and which forcibly reminds us of our status as human animals is our relationship with light. Light was a theme of our time in Knoydart when we spent many hours outdoors. Our instinctive response to the fading light levels of autumn influences our energy levels, our food and drink choices, our sleep needs and notoriously, in the light starved north, our mood. The changing of the clocks at the end of the month prompts the usual debate about how best to align time with light. The controversy about daylight saving is even more heated this year with a private members bill going through parliament in Westminster which proposes a three year trial of Single Double Summer Time (SDST = GMT+2). This would mean endless light in the summer and even darker mornings in winter but an extra hour of light in the evening (GMT+1). The arguments about safety, energy saving and social benefits are being rehearsed once more. But we cannot socially engineer nature. And in our production oriented culture driven by our presbyterian work ethic, there seems, for the majority of us, to be no avoiding the artificially imposed, unnatural schedule of the working day. The requirement that we get up and return home in darkness without seeing natural light all day means that not only are we doing, rather than being but that we are doing in the dark. No wonder we feel benighted. I admire Tom Hodkinson from The Idler and his courageous attempts to live a more naturally attuned life. Leve ignatious hyem*
*Winter is lightened by fire, phrase used in medieval calendars
