January, the dreaded month or is it? A time filled with gloom. With the festive season over and nothing much to look forward to in the coming days. Short grey days with sunshine at its premium. A period when TV adverts are geared towards New Year resolutions, getting fit, losing weight and fighting the winter bugs. A month when most prefer to spend their evenings and weekends indoors than out. A month when the entertainment industry try to brighten up the news pages with award ceremonies and glamour frocks. A month when otherwise colour evades us. The trees mostly bare, bushes and shrubs in hibernation and train platforms filled with people in grey and dark suits and coats. A month when the ground below slows down and life carries on grudgingly.
Nature, however, has its own way of brightening our lives. It is also the time of the year on a good day when the drive to work can be an absolute pleasure. The days when the grey clouds move aside and let the rays of the early morning sun filter through. The mornings when the sky lights up and transforms into a Turner or a Monet masterpiece depending on its mood. One sunrise never the same as the next. Shall I use a pink tone, a lighter or darker shade of red or an orange one with streaks of crimson running through it today, should I blend it with blue skies or hues of grey fluffy clouds, the heavens ruminate. Will the fiery sun glow with all the energy it can muster or look subdued behind veils of smoky grey clouds, each morning will decide.
The colours form the backdrop to my morning commute framing the fields and then the buildings. I sit back and enjoy. Sometimes the words ‘breathtaking’ and moments of ‘awe’ are exaggerated but in this instance I feel myself holding my breath and savouring the scene as I drive towards the vision. The colours gradually fade as the sun yawns and stretches out of his slumber and by the time I reach the top open car park at work the pink and blue skies have almost merged and I am ready to face my day.
