Winter Sunrise

     At this time of year, when there is more night than day in Oysterville, the views out our windows seem especially compelling.  It’s partly because we are looking out more than usual, hunkered snugly indoors away the cold and rain.  But, even more than that, it’s the nighttime vistas that are intriguing – the lights that punctuate the long hours of darkness, reassuring us of the greater world beyond.
     It is our habit to have our first cup of coffee looking out our east windows.  We are early risers and the world beyond is still pitchy black.  Sometimes the sky is punctuated by stars and we know that, at least for the time being, it isn’t raining.
     Often, these days, the bright lights of oyster dredges glare through the darkness.  They always look very close to shore and I never fail to be surprised, when dawn breaks, to see the dredges way out on the bay – not close at all.  My thoughts always fly to the men aboard, wondering if they suffer (as I would) from the cold and the wet and hoping that they can take a break now and then to wrap their hands around a cup of hot coffee.
     If we have time to dawdle over a second coffee, we are often rewarded with a gorgeous sunrise, the bay holding its reflection for long minutes after the sky has faded into wintery daylight.  The sun is pretty far south now, and if the colors are especially brilliant we need to go out onto our east porch to get the full effect.  I try to take pictures of the good ones, but the results are never completely satisfactory.
     In the evening, the sky and water both reflect the sunsets over the ocean.  I think that we, on the bayside, get the best of both visits – sunrises and sunsets.  Plus, the moonrise over the bays is often spectacular.  A few nights ago, a day or two beyond its full point, the moon rose over the Willapa Hills in brilliant red-orange.  Was it reflecting a fire somewhere?  It didn’t change to gold for quite a time and then, finally, well into its nightly rise, it became a silver spotlight over the water.
     Yesterday, some of our neighbors began dressing the churchyard in holiday finery.  The trees, Noble firs, were imported for the purpose and holes were dug in the lawn and the trees firmly ‘planted.’  By daylight, one looked a bit like a very tall Charlie Brown Christmas tree; the other is shorter and fuller, a squat Mama tree in counterpoint to the tall, spindly Papa nearby. When night came, however, the view out our west-facing windows was magical.  Two lovely Christmas trees alight with cheerful colors, the church glowing quietly behind them — a lovely welcome for the coming season.