Today is the shortest day of the year in the northern hemisphere. If you’re powering your electronics through solar power, as I am, you’ve made it through the least sunshine parts of the year, at least by angle.

There may be less sun for the next few months from weather if winter means more clouds or more wind that makes panels harder to keep aligned, if you can only use portable ones as I do. It will also be colder, which makes it harder to sit with them, which I have to while I can’t put them on my roof because of building construction and maintenance.

The sun going lower on the horizon creates longer shadows, which forces me to find new places with sun and to move my panels more as the shadows move faster. I’m seeing more the geography of the sun and earth. I learned this geography in school in principle, but am learning it practically now—how our ancestors did for tens of thousands of years. I’m also seeing beauty I hadn’t noticed before, despite the light pollution and air pollution. The sun going lower on the horizon also means its light traverses more atmosphere, meaning clouds obscure it more and it attenuates more.

Though it’s from April, when the weather was warmer, here’s a picture of me charging in Washington Square Park. Today the temperature was 22 degrees (-5.6C) as I returned from the park. Tomorrow I plan to charge and there will be a high of 25 F (-4C). I prefer not to go out in such cold, but the alternative is to contribute to hurting people on a scale that dwarfs slavery in this nation and the internal conflict that complicity and corruption of personal values causes.

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