As we ease into December, one blessing of the shorter day emerges – I’m witness daily to the most spectacular sunrises.
Our flat at Deal faces due east, which means the sun rises directly opposite our windows, over the sea. Around half past six, when I open the blinds, the sky is denim blue or pewter grey, a few streaks of pink playing above the horizon. By seven, the clouds are underlit with rose gold, like a renaissance painting with cherubs and angels.
Then there’s the moment where the great round disc of gold appears on the horizon, bathing everything in light, before – too often – hiding its face again in a low bank of cloud. Sometimes, that’s the only time we see the sun all day. But what an entrance.
This morning, I headed out for a run along the sea front at seven, the sun still hidden in clouds shrouding the horizon. The light was milky, the sea unusually still, mirroring the lightening sky. The grass and paths were rimed with frost. Skeins of migrating birds flew low over the gentle waves, long trains of them on a determined journey to or from our shores.
Along the beach, the clumps of oak and scrub, the stands of dried fennel and Alexanders with the last of their seeds clinging to their heads, the dark berries of ivy, shimmered with ice crystals, melting rapidly in the first of the sun’s rays. The air was sharp and I felt glad to be alive, the great dome of the sky arching above me.
I take photographs of these sunrises obsessively, hoping somehow to capture the subtlety of the light, the colours. My photos never come close to the glory of the original, but perhaps give some clue as to why I love the mornings so much in Deal.
Bloomsbury Bluestocking 