Tonight (Nov 30) and tomorrow night (Dec 1) there is a great likelihood that in areas reaching halfway down through the US, there will be auroras in the sky, because of a powerful Solar storm. For us here in the Robson Valley, it means that it will probably be overcast and cloudy.
It has been decades since I have seen a good aurora and every time I hear about one I think of the cold January night when I went out into the darkness to tryout the “Night Vision” capabilities on my camera. It was pretty frigid and dark as I ventured out into the pasture to scan the open skies through the viewfinder of my camcorder. I had the Night Vision on, and what I saw through the viewfinder was amazing: Cloud-like areas of green, swirling across my eyes.
“Wow,” I thought, “This is an amazing aurora.” I turned on the video button of the camcorder to record the incredible aurora for posterity. I kept my eyes glued into the view finder. I was so happy to be seeing and recording such an amazing display.
After a while I lowered the camcorder from my eyes, and was surprised that I couldn’t see the aurora with my naked eyes. I looked back into the viewfinder, and there it was again.
“Wait a minute, something’s not right here.” I began to think, and then it hit me. There was no aurora. What I was seeing, and recording was my breath, fogged up from the cold, and drifting across the front of my camera.
I felt pretty deflated, and foolish at all of my excitement in thinking I was witnessing an amazing aurora, that turned out to be, just my breath.
View my paintings: davidmarchant2.ca
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