Stars, satellites, slugs
A squabble-filled night walk to (not) see the Northern Lights
Having failed to see the Northern Lights on Friday (I didn’t get the memo and was already asleep), we (my partner Lee and I) decided to go out for a night walk on Saturday in the hope they’d be on repeat.
We’d started the day with a familiar stroll along the river to St Catherine’s Hill in Winchester before the weather got too hot.
Twelve hours later, we were headed back out along the same route, but this time, in darkness.
We’d packed a giant flask of tea (a herbal of rose and verbena) and a snack (a pot of pecan nuts)* and filled our rucksacks with jumpers and hats and gloves – all things that after such warm weather we couldn’t imagine wanting to wear, but that, as seasoned campers, we knew we’d be grateful for as the heat of the day ebbed away.
It was 10:15 when we set off, and it was 10:16 when we realised we were ‘at odds’ with each other**. I thought the sky already looked colourful, a pinky glow, like a more intense version of the magic hour after sunset; Lee thought it was ‘quite cloudy’. I thought it would be best to head to the side of the hill facing away from the city; Lee thought it would be more fun to see the lights over where we lived. I thought it would be poetic and romantic to walk in the pitch dark and connect with nature on a deeper level; Lee thought we should use the torch to prevent us breaking an ankle in one of the many rabbit holes*** – both valid points.
For the next half hour, we shuffled from one side of the hill to the other and back again, experiencing FOMO either way. On the city side of the hill, there was a festival atmosphere – lots of groups of people and that anticipatory buzz before a main-stage headline act (in this case billed as the Northern Lights), and, in the near distance, a background soundtrack of thumping music from a wedding party in the valley; I could just make out the song as ‘Freed from Desire’ (a track which deserves a whole Substack post of its own because of its misheard lyrics). But, on the city side, there was a risk the light pollution would mean we’d not see the Northern Lights so well. On the darker side of the hill, the sky seemed more hopeful, but it felt a bit lonely and, when we did walk past another group of people, we got barked at by what seemed like the world’s most ferocious dog.
Both of us were a bit tired, quite grumpy, generally ‘out of sorts’, and weighted down by the unspoken pressure of ‘must see the lights, must see the lights’. I’d already decided I wanted to share a photo of the Northern Lights on my Substack today, so I was determined to will the universe to let me get that shot. The sights we did see, ones that would usually be ‘oh wow’ (a shooting star! a satellite! and, on the ground, more slugs than you’ve ever seen in your life!), seemed just not good enough.
We stood in silence, drank some tea, felt annoyed with the sky and with each other, and hoped that, were we to get lost on the way home or some sort of apocalypse situation were to take place, we wouldn’t fight too much over who got to have the last pecan nut.
After nearly an hour of waiting around (perhaps we were impatient; some people were staying out on the hill till 3 am), we finally agreed on something: to give up and go home. And, as soon as we made the decision to accept the disappointment of not seeing what we’d set out to see, everything felt lighter.
Once we were back down at the foot of the hill and walking along the river, we felt free from the ‘tick-box’ of seeing the lights and started to enjoy our surroundings in the way we had earlier in the day: without expectation but with plenty of wonderment and awe.
We noticed the curve of the crescent moon reflected in the river. We shone the torch into the water and saw hundreds of tiny fish. And we knew the swans and sheep and sparrows we’d seen that morning were there too, resting in the darkness.
*in my family, if you tell a story that mentions food or drink, you will be quizzed on exactly what you had, so I’ve got in the habit of providing this level of snack-detail unprompted.
**when I read this post aloud to Lee before pressing publish, he suggested ‘mortal enemies’ as a better description
***I’ve written so much in my other posts about metaphorical rabbit holes, I didn’t think I’d be writing about literal ones.