The Borrowed Afternoon

Saturday. June 13th. The light today is extraordinary — we’re eight days from the solstice and the sun is doing its best work. If you go outside between two and four o’clock today, there’s a specific quality to the afternoon light that only exists in this narrow window of the year. Low enough to be golden. Strong enough to be warm. The kind of light that makes ordinary things look like they’re worth painting.

I call days like this borrowed afternoons. They feel like they’re giving you something extra, something you didn’t quite have coming, just because the world is doing something beautiful today and you happened to be in it.

Go find a spot in that light. Sit in it. Let it be what it is. You can deal with the rest of the day after — the afternoon will be gone by five.

Some afternoons are borrowed gifts. The golden ones in June go fast.

What’s your favorite thing to do in summer afternoon light?