A Certain Quality of Light

"Quality of Light"  copyright 2011 by Caris Cerdwyn, all rights reserved

This photo, taken at another favorite spot, reminds me of a Thomas Kinkaid painting.  So that's where he gets his inspiration!  Up at the crack of dawn or waiting for sunset.  Those clouds and that sky reflected in the river is just what it looked like this morning...those wonderful hues of gold and yellow, lavender, blue, pink, even purple.  The great artists have taught us that there are many more colors to be seen that we see at first glance. 

For a while, when I was in my thirties, I lived in a place called the Colstein Valley at a very northern-most point in California.  You could see Mount Shasta (an exceedingly magical place), off in the distance.  Our neighbors grew asparagus (yum!), and my friend and I lived in a big old farmhouse, with a "REAL" pantry and potato bin.  The thing that I so remember about that place, aside from a mystical mountain so close at hand, was the quality of the light.  It ALWAYS seemed golden to me...a bit like the photo.  Every walk I took, every day that I planted seeds beneath it, every moment I sat at my desk looking out at the valley, every blanket of snowfall that reflected it, made me feel there was something special, healing and miraculous about the light. 

I always remember the one day I stepped outside at daybreak and I felt as though I was being whooshed away, someplace out of my body for a moment, the scene before me so startling.  That it took my breath away is an understatement.  For one terrifying and oddly exhuberant moment I honestly thought the sky was on fire.  That wide open horizon was a deep crimson with odd formations of clouds stretched out as far as could be seen. 

Well, the light this morning reminded me of that place.  It was tinged with the miraculous, and I felt it all the way through me.