An idea
Light
How the dark gets brightened
Light is the fastest thing in the universe, and it carries almost everything we know about the world. It bounces, it bends, it separates into colors, and some living things have learned to make it themselves.
It is worth noticing how many different ways light shows up at bedtime: in the color of the sky, in the shape of the Moon, in a flash above the grass, and in the simple fact that you can see this room at all.
The shape of it
Where it turns up
10 nights that touch this idea.
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Rainbows
Where colors wait
White light was carrying every color the whole time. Rain just lets them show.
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Sight
How the world gets inside your head
Light bounces off everything and pours through two small windows, and your brain builds the world.
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Aurora
A crown of gentle light
Particles from the Sun meet the gases high in our air, and the sky glows green and violet.
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Fireflies
The light that waited
Cold light: almost all of a firefly's energy becomes light instead of heat.
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Bioluminescence
Nature's living light
Living things in the deep sea making their own soft blue light, with no wires and no warmth.
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Moon Phases
Why the moon changes shape
The Moon makes no light of its own. We only ever see the half the Sun is lighting.
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Shooting Stars
Wishes on ancient dust
The streak is not the dust burning. It is the air glowing as the dust squeezes it.
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The Sun
Anchor of the solar system
The light on your wall left the Sun about eight minutes ago.
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Fireworks
The earth painting the sky
Each color is a different metal: copper burns blue, strontium red, barium green.
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Black Holes
The deep rivers of space
The one place light goes in and does not come back out.
Keep following