We’re taking care of Sasha for a couple of weeks. She needs at least one walk per day, and I prefer to take her when it is light out. These days the sun rises around 11:00 am, then slips below the horizon around 2:30.
By 2 pm I’d already walked for several hours while rewriting my WIP, but that hadn’t done Sasha any good. I tried to coax her onto the treadmill with a dog bisquit, but she didn’t want any part of it.
So, off we went. She snuffed her nose in the snow at 10 below zero, hunting for voles I think, and peed anywhere the snow was already yellow.
Toward the end of our romp, we were coming down a hill. We broke out of the woods and had a view of the Alaska Range. It cut a jagged line on the horizon about a hundred miles to the south. The sky was clear and the sun was just starting to set. Sasha whined while I stopped to watch.
Just after the sun slid below the horizon, a half-sun of bright green appeared, hung in the sky for several seconds, then vanished. The photo below will give you an idea of what I saw, except the green I saw was brighter, and contrasted by the white of the snow.
I’d heard about the Green Flash, an image of the sun created by refraction when conditions are right. I spend a lot of time outside, had hoped to see the green flash plenty of times, but had never seen it until today. (It’s like my one and only mountain lion sighting, but that’s a story for another post.)
Anyway, thanks to Sasha, I just happened to be in the right place at the right time for the Green Flash. And, I was paying attention.
Do you have a right place at the right time story? Or a wrong place at the wrong time story? What happened?
It was mid-April, and where I used to live in Pennsylvania mid-April snowstorms are usually pretty mild, but we were lucky enough to get just over a foot. I decided to take advantage of the fact that I didn’t have to be at work until 1 and went out for a rare spring ski with the dog. We paused on the bridge over the lake (it had already thawed with some warmer weather at the beginning of the month) and had the chance to see a bald eagle swoop in for fish breakfast just a few feet from us. Unlike you, I wasn’t lucky enough to have a camera with me, but the image stays with me.
That green sun looks like something out of science fiction movie, very cool.
Paul, if you stop by my blog today, I do have a blog award for you.
I almost always am in the right place in the right time. But I never have a camera and I barely remember afterward. I think that is a bad trait for a writer!
I’ve said it before I think, but I think it is brilliant that you walk as you write.
Oh man Paul! This post is absolutely wonderful. And the pics are awesome. Weren’t you in awe when you saw the green flash? And aren’t you glad Sasha finds treadmillin rather boring?
She deserves her favorite meal and lots of doggy biscuits too.
My right place at the right time is probably how my characters got lost in the mountains. I say that because without the how I wouldn’t have anything else.
Happy Sunday to you.
Just want to clarify that the Green Flash photo sequence is the best I could find that represents what I saw. I didn’t have a chance to take a photo of what I witnessed. The white landscape made the green particularly bright, much brighter than the posted photo depicts.
Alissa, that bald eagle sighting sounds amazing.
Tina, I think there is something to be learned from your positive attitude. Thanks!
Robyn, I think I’d like to read your book. Let me know if you want to share it, or trade.
Hey Paul – I still need to get a treadmill and set up a writing station. I so want to do that. The picture of you walking has inspired me again. I’m also stunned by the green sun flash. I’ve never heard of that, but it sounds so alien and awesome. The only stories I can think of for right place or wrong place have to do when I lived in Haines, Alaska for 3 months. I stepped outside of my friends house and in the backyard was a giant moose. I’d never seen one in real life before. It was awesome and I took a picture, but my camera got lost for a long time and when I found it years later and had the film developed the picture was cloudy. So sad, but it was awesome.
Got to tell you, I really did the treadmill computer set up. It’s brilliant. Also, the green flash shots are mind blowing.
Got to tell you, I really did the treadmill computer set up. It’s brilliant. Also, the green flash shots are mind blowing…
That’s amazing! It must be incredible living where you do, although I’m not sure about the 3 and a bit hours of sunlight. I don’t know if I could do that.
Wow, what an amazing thing to witness. And I thought the northern lights were spectacular. Thanks for posting about this. I hadn’t heard of it!
WOW the green flash. That’s rare inland. My mother saw it once. Now I know 2 people who have seen it.
Definitely a great moment for you – thanks for sharing.
I had one of those moments last New Year’s day. It was a magical moment involving fireworks and Jeff Buckley’s Alleluia…all impromptu.
I blogged about it: http://skateorbate.blogspot.com/2009/01/one-of-those-perfect-moments.html
It’s a pretty cool story.
That light flash is awesome. What a sight to see. Sasha is a beautiful girl. Maybe you will get her routine perfected before she has to go home. I tried the treadmill routine with my Lab and he turned his nose in the air and huffed away. He was having no part of it.
I had never thought about your limited hours of daylight before this. I was feeling sorry for myself because we are down to 8 hours a day – guess I should be glad for what I have.
Thanks for the visits and comments on my blog.
Beautiful picture and cute dog too! I was enroute to Toronto a good many years ago and saw a perfectly round rainbow through the window. A silouette of the airplane was centered in the rainbow. And me without me camera… It’s alright though, the image is burned in my memory.
That is awesome! I’ve never heard of it before. Your pictures are gorgeous too.
My MG novel’s climax is a wrong place, wrong time moment. My MC and her friend come face to face with bank robbers and (due to poor timing) get trapped in an abandoned steel mill with them.
Cool pictures, wish I could have seen that with my own eyes…
Once, I was in Marquette, (Upper Peninsula) in Michigan during a rain shower. A break in the clouds fanned a double rainbow directly over the lighthouse. I even had a camera! Pictures came out a little fuzzy—in my excitement, I forgot to adjust the f-stop. It was way cool anyway.
Well, I hope it’s the right story at the right time, but they remains to be seen. As for the green flash, that is amazing. Alaska certainly has some interesting environmental characteristics. Thanks for sharing the pictures. I’d never heard of the green flash.
The right story at the right time. I hope that for you, too!!
What a neat experience! And, of course Sasha won’t come up on the treadmill for a milkbone. They’re dry and boring. I bet she’d hop on for a slice of bacon, though.
Well, even Theodora the Cat had to admit Sasha is a very clever dog (not even bribery can change her mind!)!! But what a fantastic experience the Green Flash must have been. Alaska and the Artic circle is one place I’d love to visit.
Arctic Circle. I meant to say Arctic Circle (not Artic)!
That is so neat that you got to see that! I like the picture with Sasha completely showing no interest in the treadmill. Hee!
About a month ago, I won a free loaf of French bread at Safeway for being the [some number] shopper. Does that count?
I saw the green flash once when I was on a cruise! I’d never heard of it until the day I saw it: My dad was telling me about it and how he’d looked for it his whole life. And then as we were watching the sun set on the ocean we saw it! It was pretty much the coolest thing I’ve ever seen. It sounds like it would be even cooler against the snow! Yay for Sasha!
I had never heard of Green Flash. That’s amazing. Thanks for the story and photos.
Being in the right place? Well, once I came within a few feet of being run over by a moose crashing down a hillside to the trail I was on. But we both stared at each other in amazement and went our own ways.
Another time I was walking on a beach when I saw what looked like big surf miles ahead. I decided to spend the time and energy walking to it. And I was rewarded with seeing double-overhead waves being surfed by top-notch surfers. That was breathtaking.
I’m always amazed by everyone’s stories. I love hearing about them. Thanks for taking the time to share them with me and everyone else who reads the comments. Double Rainbows, round rainbows, a close enounter with a moose, fireworks and a loaf of bread, and another person who has seen the green flash! Wow! They just keep coming!
Pat/Tricia, Valerie, and Ann, thanks for stopping by my blog. I hope you come back often.
I feel like I learn something new every time I stop by. Green light–who would have thought? (Sasha’s adorable, by the way!)
Hey Paul, I’ve been meaning to get back by. Actually my story is going out to agents at the end of this month. *fingers crossed*
But anytime you need a reader let me know. That’s why we’re here. 
To encourage and to lend a hand.
Talk to you soon. BTW, I hope to get to Alaska sometime soon. In a year or so. It seems so beautiful. I want to be there when I can experience the shorter days. That must really be something.
Merry Christmas!
A yearning of mine is to see the Northern Lights. Thanks ever so much for letting me experience it here on your blog.
My first novel, An Irishwoman’s Tale, was penned when I was unagented. Clueless. But the publisher CRAVED Irish stories.
God’s place. God’s time.
Unfathomable.
Enjoyed seeing your blog today at Jody’s crowded place. Plan to stop by again!
Patti
http://www.pattilacy.com/blog
P.S. One of my Ladies of Grace used to live in Alaska, just visited, and asked for prayer of freezing temperatures. She was going to some hot springs!
God answered her prayer!!!!
Thanks for stopping by Patti. There is a photo of the Northern Lights on my post: Seasonal Writing Disorder.
It is different from The Green Flash but just as amazing.
Hi Paul,
It is nice getting caught up with your blog. We had some 0 F temps down here (and -20-30 in Stanley) recently. No green flashes lately, but I look for them every chance I get. My best results are with binoculars and I sneak a few quick looks at the setting sun seconds before it is optimal so I don’t miss it and don’t fry my eyes. Then, at the critical moment, I center the sun in the binoculars and there it is. The duration must be longer in the higher lattitudes when the sun makes a low angle approach to the horizon.
whoa! you actually saw this? amazing!
Sorry I’m so behind the curve. This is WAY cool! I saw your tweet, but didn’t know what you were talking about. It’s like the end of Pirates of the Caribbean III. The Flying Dutchmen with Will Turner at the helm should have erupted out of the sea. You just didn’t wait long enough!
How amazing you were able to see that!
(love the treadmill/computer set up!)