The Dark

When I go to bed at night in the winter, the room seems to be completely dark except for some faint light coming from a window with light-colored blinds. The illumination comes from the outdoor lights of people who live behind us. 

If I stay awake long enough, my eyes dilate and I see more and more light. But that first moment of mostly darkness made me think about how little people, especially in the industrialized world, spend in complete darkness. Even when we (or people who do because I don't) go camping we build fires, take flashlights and lanterns. My father had a Colman gas lantern that burned "white gas" and had two "mantels" that didn't burn despite looking like they were made of threads. You had to pump it up to get it started. Apparently, they still sell them.

In pre-industrial times, light was expensive to make. Candles were hand-made and firewood had to be sourced from nearby woods, if there were woods. Bedouin tribes in the Sahara Desert used olive oil or animal oils in lamps according to Google. That olive oil must have been expensive.

Humanity has long ached to expel the darkness. There could be something dangerous out in the dark. There's a science fiction/horror movie, Pitch Black, that uses the dark to enhance the terror. That's probably true for a lot of horror movies, I just watch so few of them.

I think about shepherds out on hillsides in ancient times. They may have built a fire for warmth and light but all they had to do was watch the sheep and the sky. Of course, the ancients watching the sky is where the constellations and a lot of star names come from. 

Think about before fire was discovered. humans and proto-humans had no light at night. It must have been so dark. So dark we today can hardly comprehend it. And that would be scary.

The dark makes some people uncomfortable; I can understand why. 

Does the dark make you uncomfortable? Or do you enjoy the dark? Let me know in the comments below.