Day and Night

I was walking home from my late class one night and I started thinking about my “beauty of nature” blog last week. Not only did I begin to think about the beauty of nature that night, but also the pure beauty of the idea of day and night. It amazed me that in that moment something so completely simple was so beautiful. It truly is the little things in life that people don’t usually notice that are the most beautiful things.

Day is bright and night is dark. The day has the sun and the night has the moon. Night isn’t usually experienced as much as day because we sleep at night. You hear people say they’re scared of the dark of night, but why? You don’t see many people afraid of the daylight, unless you watch The Benchwarmers (only some of you will understand that reference). The bottom line is, day and night are completely opposite, yet they are very similar. That may not make sense yet, but eventually it will.

I stood there in the night thinking about how similar night and day actually are. Generally when you have a nice day with a blue sky that leads to a nice night with a lot of stars. And to me I see both of those things as beautiful. It amazes me that something that simple can actually be beautiful. When you think about it, what happens during the day directly relates to what will happen at night. By that I mean if it isn’t a nice day out, the night likely isn’t going to be nice. If it rains during the day it is either also raining at night or there aren’t stars because of the overcast. It’s so simple to the naked eye, but it seems so complex to me when I really dive into it and think about it. But although they’re beautiful together, they’re even more beautiful when you think about them separately.

Naturally I’m going to start with day. The sun itself just brings a sort of liveliness to days. When I go outside and don’t see the sun I usually feel lazy. The rain definitely isn’t something that anyone loves all the time, but I love looking out the window and watching the rain fall to the ground. Sometimes I even like going out and running around in the rain if it’s during the spring or summer. Everyone will probably witness a rainbow at some point in their lives, and it’s really weird if you think about it. Combine the rain that everyone dreads and the bright sun that cheers us up and get something amazing. A rainbow is simple and complex at the same time, but it is definitely a beauty of the daytime.

Then there’s night. It’s dark and may seem boring. But think about the things you see in the night. The stars come out at night, and the stars shine so bright and beautiful. I love just laying outside with my girlfriend and looking up at the stars. It relaxes me so much. The moon and the stars are so far away from us, but they can be appreciated anyway. When I see a bright moon it always catches my eyes and I end up getting lost looking at it. The sounds of the darkness may be scary sometimes because you have absolutely no idea what is around you, but the sights are beautiful.

Day and night are complete opposites, but they’re both beautiful in their own special ways. I hope that this makes you want to look outside or go stand outside and just appreciate what’s around you. Appreciate the beauty of our world and specifically the beauty of the simple things like day and night. There is so much beauty around us that we are oblivious to. So open your eyes, there’s beauty right in front of you.

-Eric Proulx