Since I’ve had this job (about 3 years now) and have been riding to the Skytrain station most mornings, I’ve been much more aware of how the sun arcs through the morning sky during its yearly cycle. Also, because I’m into photography a lot more in recent years (the convenience of digital), I’m more keenly aware of light in general.
I took a photo on January 30 from the back steps at the office in Burnaby that captured the intensity of the sunrise reflecting off the glass envelopes of the twin office towers at Metrotown. I’ve noticed since that the same reflection can’t be obtained at other times of the year.
This morning was the first time this year that the sun was exactly at the crest of the small hill on my street so that I couldn’t see the hill at all as I approached the stop sign. I had to use my hand to shield the entire top portion of the hill from view in order to see the hill at all. And forget about seeing oncoming traffic; it was impossible. I stopped and moved the palm of my hand in a circular pattern to see as much as I could before proceeding. That intersection in particular is notorious for glide-pasts. People seem to think that despite not having clear views in either direction due to parked cars that there’s barely a need to slow down, much less stop. Anyway, that’s fuel for a rant; I’m getting off topic.
The same situation presented itself again (the blinding sun, not people ignoring a stop sign) a few minutes later at the bottom of Keith Drive where it intersects E. 7th Avenue. I turn there to go to the Clarke Drive Skytrain station most mornings. It’s a longer hill at that point so it wasn’t quite as problematic to see oncoming traffic.What’s interesting to me is the fact that by Monday (three days from now) the sun’s arc will have shifted a few degrees South, just enough to eliminate that glaring condition, and corresponding photo op, at those hills at that particular time in the morning.
(I’m posting this blog post late because it took me 10 more days to get the right photo of the scene that I describe in the post. And the scene I did capture was 5 blocks South of the street I live on. That illustrates how far the sun has marched South in only 10 days.)
That’s the beauty of living at this latitude. Not only do we get all forms of precipitation and cloud cover, we also get a wide array of sunlight scenarios. My wife works with a guy from Cuba, and he tells me that the sun doesn’t have nearly so much of an arc in that region of the world. The temperature stays relatively constant all year, and the hours of daylight don’t change much. I’d never really thought about that before, but of course, it makes sense. The closer you get to the equator, the smaller the sun’s arc will be.
Despite the allure of wearing shorts and sandals year round at Cuba’s latitude, I wouldn’t trade it for the wide variety photo ops in Vancouver.
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