A random photo and a random story, both from England, on how things can look different when seen at twilight.

First, the photo.

We arrived at the hotel in Manchester, England around 7:30pm. The sun had just set and our hotel room faced out onto a cathedral that was bathed in the glow of the setting sun:

Manchester church at twilight (original)

OK, bathed in the glow is a bit strong to describe that – the church was mostly in darkness. However, with the magic of digital photography, I was able to recover a bit of the true colors of the church under all that darkness:

Manchester church at twilight (enhanced)

See, in bright daylight, that church must actually be red, while at twilight it appears to be merely shades of white, gray and black.

Now the story.

Later that week we were staying with friends in York, England.  The little girl next door, who was 8 or 9, would come zooming over to greet us as we arrived at the house each day.

Now, the first day we arrived in the mid-afternoon, and the sun was shining brightly as our friend introduced us to his little neighbor.

The next evening, I arrived back at the house by myself, just after sunset – i.e. twilight. It was bright enough to see by, but there was no bright sunlight beaming down.

The little neighbor girl came over and said hello, and I asked her how her school day had been. We had established the day before, you see, that school had just started that week. But she gave me a quizzical look and asked how I had known she had started school that week.  I explained that we’d met the day before, when I had been with 2 men, my husband and our friend (her neighbor).

She looked at me, and said in a matter-of-fact tone in a way only a little kid can use, “No, you can’t be the lady from yesterday. Your hair wasn’t white yesterday. ”

Ah, well, can’t argue with that. However, could we say that my current naturally two-toned hair looks brown under bright light, but silver by twilight? I’m not sure I’m willing to concede it looks white just yet… 😉