Here comes the sun

Write a story about light returning to a place that has been deprived of it for a long time, literally or figuratively.

There’s only one thing that comes to mind, one thing that has been on my mind, for months. It’s not an obsession. It’s the truth. This place has been really, really, really dark for what seems like forever. I mean it. The sun never shines here, never ever. We are all very tired of waiting…

[Chorus]

So tired, tired of waiting

Tired of waiting for you

So tired, tired of waiting

Tired of waiting for you

[Verse]

I was a lonely soul

I had nobody 'til I met you

But you keep-a me waiting

All of the time, what can I do?

Yes, Kinks, you are more relevant than ever, although your song is sixty years old. Maybe what we’re all waiting for isn’t love and companionship, though. Or is it? We are definitely lonely, but it’s a different condition we’re suffering from. It’s been like living in a Nordic country, but for those people the long nights are part of life, and there are many things to do when sunlight is scarce. Our shadows are different. They are unnatural, painful, abusive.

It wasn’t always like this. Summers were a solid glow for three months and winters sparkled with snow crystals. Autumn was pure fire with leaves worthy of crowning hills and paths in ways we loved and vowed never to forget. Spring, wonderful, young spring, the shine of sprouting leaves and lettuce, the glint of cardinal wings, silky blue squills lining a yard. Then, nothing.

It didn’t happen all at once. The loss of light, I mean. The candles and porch lights flickered at first, but they didn’t go out. Yet the shadows crept closer and closer. Some of us didn’t notice, or didn’t care. Maybe they thought there was something wrong with their vision and they needed to have their eyes examined. Why else would the fog come rolling in and never leave? It was dangerous to drive with those conditions and some people had very serious accidents. So serious they disappeared. We lost a whole lot of people, but it was either a slow process or there were no traces of them anywhere. We began to get a little worried.

The grayness started to spread and it seeped into everything we saw, did, heard, tasted, touched. It was like cotton balls stored (for some reason) in a dusty box in the far corner of a basement. Colorless yet dark. Gloom began to settle over those of us who cared and whose heads were not in the sand.

I had a dream, which was not all a dream.

The bright sun was extinguish'd, and the stars

Did wander darkling in the eternal space,

Rayless, and pathless, and the icy earth

Swung blind and blackening in the moonless air;

Morn came and went—and came, and brought no day,

Some of us wanted to run from the dark, while others sought consolation in fighting it off with poetry, art, songs, even dancing. We worked very hard at lifting the veil, but even the words of the talented Lord Byron were not effective. We began to feel very afraid. The nights that surrounded us showed signs of never ending. We thought that if we walked or drove down the street we might never find our way home, even if we had a flashlight.

The temptation was strong to just give up and let the maelstrom of black clouds suck us into it, taking our thoughts, our plans, our ability to be beautiful, drowning us in our fears. We were beginning to lose our grip on existence, wondering if we should bother to leave our houses since it was no longer safe. So many had disappeared…

Not that there was a reason to go out any more, unless it was to go grocery shopping or pick up a prescription. Nobody was interested in going out to a concert or a play, because we all felt the damp breath behind us, on our shoulders. Going out meant we were still reaching for the bit of humanity we imagined might still be out there. The talent we used to have for dancing, our love of libraries, of ideas. Conversations we used to look forward to in quilting and book groups, cooking classes, going to classes of any kind. Learning new things.

Why? We started to ask, because nobody knew the answer. We did, however, remember things we had read a long time ago, and so we reread them, but only in our heads. We were sad about this, but we kept remembering. Orwell and Atwood were the most popular, but their books made our hearts ache. At least with the darkness we began to lose interest in most of life and we started to forget the things and people who had once brought us pleasure, or entertained us.

Things we forgot were the county fairs with the animals, ribbon competitions in sewing, cooking, and so forth. We forgot the taffy and the fries in cones with malt vinegar. We forgot the games you played, three darts or balls for a dollar, where you could win a stuffed animal. We forgot all the smells, the shrieks of children on fast, looping rides, the craft exhibits. It was too dark to see anything most of the time, plus it was scary being out at night, knowing we might not make it home.

Then, in the midst of all the black and gloom, the fear, the giving up, surrendering, loss of interest in seeing or making things, somebody organized a big fair, a national one, with everything we were supposed to want. It turned out to be an effort to advertise things we were supposed to buy, only we weren’t seduced by advertisements any more. Our money was useless, you might say, because we didn’t want to buy any of the items being thrown at us in booths that were all fourth grade computer generated cubicles we didn’t need to visit because we could see all that stuff on our screens.

The night was virtually complete, both as far as what we could see and as far as our hearts could react, which wasn’t far because everything was boring, low quality, a shell. We were preparing ourselves for an eternity of misery, not even thinking about turning on the lights any longer. Why bother? Nothing was legal any more, nothing led to progress, new thoughts, fun. It was clear that the somber scenery in front of us had gotten hold of us and wanted us to cease to exist.

There were very few attendees at the fair they organized for us, because like I said there was little more than hot air to be had. Even water was forbidden, so we risked sunstroke if we went. Then something happened that we didn’t understand but which made us stop, listen, then act. A single person, who might have been mad (many of us had gone that route in the past months), stood in the center of the green and put his or her hands up in the air. The person shouted: We’re so tired, tired of waiting, and started telling a story about where they were from. Others came closer and started to tell their own stories.

The words in those stories were like little beacons in the night that was swallowing us all up. We followed them into the absurd cubicles that were just square air holders, and began to do things we’d nearly forgotten how to do. We baked, we painted, we made things with our hands, we wrote things down. We sucked out all the dead, dry, dull, stony air and replaced it with us. We created new jokes, sewed, composed songs, listened to one another. We looked into the eyes of all the others who were there with us, smiled, and rested.

Shortly after that, the world went into reverse and it was as if every light bulb, every candle, every flashlight, ever7star, had been lit. The light was dazzling, but we welcomed it with a passion. Those who had been going around dimming our lights arrived at the fair, which was now ours and was now full of attendees. They thought they could stop us with threats and guns, but we were done stumbling around in blackness. We eliminated the threat in a way I won’t reveal. It took a lot of effort, but we did it.

The light is back, we are all here, and we are ready for the party. The Beatles sang, and we concur:

Here comes the sun, doo-doo-doo

Here comes the sun

And I say, "It's all right"

Little darlin'

It's been a long, cold, lonely winter

Little darlin'

It feels like years since it's been here

Here comes the sun, doo-doo-do

Here comes the sun

And I say, "It's all right"

We’re thinking about making this song our national anthem. We’re never letting the sun out of our sight again.