The Sunset

December 7, 2010

I have the most beautiful view of a sunset from my bedroom window.  It is nearly 10 o’clock and it is still light out.  From my room I can see the expanse of the dark blue sky. As I lower my eyes the sky fades to a highlighter yellow.  From yellow it quickly fades to apricot and then the sky touches the low lying clouds over the Tasman.  I can see the huge Southern Alpine hillsides to the left and I know that beyond that lies the Fox Glacier.  Hanging just to the right of the hills is the thinnest, sliver of a moon.  The moon hovers just above the highlighter yellow in the softer blue sky.  It is cupping up toward the sky which according to old wives’ tales means it will rain tomorrow so I’d better enjoy the clear sky while I have the chance.  

The moon shines golden-like over the whole scene.  It may be only a sliver, but it makes this sunset that much more powerful to behold.  It is understated, but that understated attitude is the icing on the cake.  I can’t keep my eyes off it and every few moments I turn back to the window to get a glance at the tiny little moon hanging above a New Zealand sunset.  How marvelous our Creator is, that he would make a landscape so lovely and cover it in the shades of light that I see before me.  

I’ve just come home from my first New Zealand barbeque and made myself a cup of real New Zealand tea.  The barbeque was a birthday celebration for the cook at the restaurant in the hotel.  Her birthday is tomorrow, but since most of us had today off we celebrated today.  Josh created a lovely meal with four different kinds of meat and we had salad and potatoes and potato chips.  It was mostly the gang from the hotel plus the house of folks that live next door who work at Fox Guiding.  (Fox Guiding takes people up onto the glacier since it is too unsafe to go alone.)

It was absolutely roaring hot when we got the barbeque started and I loved it!  I was so cold yesterday and so cold this morning at work that when the sunshine came out I felt like I was defrosting!  The barbeque was a good chance to get to know Cookie, the birthday girl, and Maureen, who works in housekeeping, as well as the folks who live at the Fox Guiding house.  I just enjoyed the company.  Maureen is incredibly friendly.  She is older and has worked at a lot of hotels in Australia and New Zealand.  I really like her a lot.

I spent a good portion of the afternoon playing rummy with Josh.  He was bored because it was his day off and I offered to play cards with him.  He loved it and now he wants to learn to play poker.  I told him I have no idea how to play poker.  He’ll have to learn that from someone else!

We played at the kitchen table until I said I just had to go outside and enjoy the hot sunshine.  So we played on the front steps.  We don’t have any outdoor furniture which would be nice on a hot day like today, but unusable on a day like yesterday when it rains all day long!

Caroline has moved out of our house and into a tiny little one on the other side of this housing “commune”.  We really are a bit of a commune stuck between two roads.  On the main road is Caroline’s new house.  Behind that is the house that the guides live in.  Cookie’s house is next to that, and between the guide house and Cookie’s is a tiny little house.  I haven’t met the people that live there yet.  Caroline says they stick to themselves.  Then my house is next to their house and the quieter road.  Our house will seem quieter without Caroline who kind of holds us all together.  But I know she will be over all the time visiting and we all work with her so it won’t be that big of a change.

It is almost dark now and the moon has dipped a bit lower.  It is just barely suspended above the hillsides.  Now the hills are in a sharper focus and are sharply silhouetted.  I think it’s about time to turn in for the night and hope that tomorrow’s sunset comes close to tonight’s!