Last Sunday was the autumnal equinox. A moment of uneasy equilibrium, when day and night briefly share 12 hours before daylight tumbles towards the winter solstice. I meant to go for a run, and pay special attention to the sunrise or sunset. To mark the moment with pictures, maybe write about it. I didn’t remember. I did run but it was raining and, behind the clouds, the sun was just an assumption.
This morning while I drank my pre-run coffee I read about the equinox. I learned about the “solar terminator” – the edge between night and day – that separates the part of the earth experiencing darkness from that experiencing daylight. A circle constantly rotating around the earth’s surface, twice a day, moving at 463 metres per second. At the equinox, it moves around the globe like a spinning line of longitude – bringing darkness on one side, and light on the other.
In spring and autumn, at the vernal and autumnal equinoxes, both poles see the sun, and both northern and southern hemispheres share the light equally. Afterwards, one’s loss is the other’s gain.
The weeks around the equinox are a dream time for running. Every pre- or post-work run catches a sunrise or sunset. One wet evening I chanced on a rainbow in the eastern sky, the nearby clouds lit purple. But really I’m a sunrise person. In between some biblical rain, this month I’ve seen the mist rise from the River Ouse over York Minster, caught the first light of the sun turning a gate into a magic portal, and gazed on ghost trees in the fog over flooded fields.
At sunrise, I have the paths to myself. I like to run along the river, or in the woods. The colder nights and still warm days mean that vapour rises from the water and floats among the trees. The grass is soaking, and fences drip with tiny golden orbs of dew. In the city, the neon lights of the Esso garage are briefly a fairground ride against the technicolour sky.
This morning I remembered the Equinox – a week late, but does it matter? The sun rose today at 7am, and will set at 6:41pm. The nights are being drawn in for us in the northern hemisphere, whilst the days loosen their grip, extending their warm grasp southwards.
At the gate to Old Sulehay woods, the fog was lying over flooded fields, with a sunrise lightshow peaking high above. To the south of the path, the meadow was waist high with grasses lit ochre, mist blurring the trees and bringing everything closer, nearer. I took some pictures and they are spectacular but they don’t contain it. The sounds of birds rustling and settling and jostling the leaves. The distant cars that never appear. The tiny lights of a farmhouse on the horizon.
In the woods, the lightshow is reduced to a strip of gold and blue overhead, with clouds looming pink in the west over the horse chestnut trees. A carpet of curling leaves and conkers litter the top of the hill. It is darker here, and a tiny bit creepy. I take my earbuds out so that I can hear the birds, but also the sound of anyone approaching. Back on the road, the sun has risen and drifts of roadside weeds burn orange against the fields. No interesting birds today, just pigeons and magpies, starlings. A few pheasants.
No hares in the fields, but plenty of deer. I run a couple of miles along the road to Kings Cliffe, stopping for a wee behind a gate. Over 11 miles, I don’t see any people. A few cars, but no cyclists, runners or dog walkers. Everyone is at home, in bed or inside, enjoying the warmth. Maybe putting the heating on for the first time. Maybe preparing to go out later, when I will be at home warming up and hiding inside.
This summer, on holiday in Sardinia, I took a video of a sunrise over the sea as it lapped against a ruined tower. When I uploaded it, instagram asked me if I wanted to flag it as AI. At dawn, the world looks so perfect that it doesn’t seem possible, or real. Mid-way through the clip, a tiny mosquito buzzes across the screen on its way to biting my arm in three places.
Not a Jogger 