On the last day of October, a couple of days after Sandy had reshaped our shores, the sun rose at 6:27 AM here, then snuggled its way west at 4:53 PM, ten hours and 26 minutes later. The sunlight was dimming.
Today, for the first time since Sandy, we had ten hours and 26 minutes of sunshine, again. We're shoveling out of a moderate winter storm, but we're OK, again.
And the sunlight is returning.
I teach biology, but most of my lambs will leave my classroom in June, and not really get their connection to the sun. Every step they take, every thought of those they love, every complex molecule in their bodies owes its existence to the sun.
I'm OK with this.
What I am not OK with is filling their heads with so much nonsense that they no longer notice that the sun comes, the sun goes, and then comes back again.
I expect I have a few more days left with exactly 10 hours and 26 minutes of sunlight. But not so many as I used to.
I have no desire to tell my students what to do.
I do care, though, to let them know they only have a finite amount of time to do it.
I teach children. What do you do?