DARKNESS NIGHT

Tomorrow night is No Electric Light Night for those of us in on it in these parts, when we will use only candles and lanterns and show ourselves and the kids what darkness is and means, and how much a part of life it is and true, and how familiar it can be and not to fear, so much has been forgotten of where we were and whence we came and how-- Already it recalls to me one moonless night while we were living on an island off the coast of Spain, out on a point with the ocean at our front, with no electricity, not long after we'd moved there with as it turned out only one candle to cook and eat by there was a knock from the dark at the dark door, it was an old man without light who had come round the point from the sea and had walked the long dark road to our candle to ask the way to the village over the mountain, and would go into the night and over the mountain without light and how would he see, I city-wondered. Before long we too were walking over the mountain along stony paths even on moonless nights, seeing fine by the light of the stars and the ancient light-finding strength that had been in our eyes all along unasked for, and so never received until now. More than ever, we need to learn what darkness has to teach us that we do not know we already know, from long before our own lives. We should share this knowledge with our children, that the world may be the simpler place it is, both day and night--