Bushfire haze
Daddy, come and see. There's something strange in the sky. Something red.
So, I thought, UFOs at the age of five. Let's go and de-bunk this one.
It was so innocent, that she had not seen the sun before. (Not since she was about 2, and was at the beach, and saw a sunset, with the sun sitting just above the horizon at the end of the beach, and started walking along the beach because she wanted to go and see the sun). This was different though, and so reasonable - because it did not look like the sun.
Standing inside, looking through the window, the house smelling of smoke that had blown here from hundreds of kilometres away, and a dull haze in all directions - obscuring the view like a thin fog. You could feel the particles in the air, breathing them in, caught in the nose and the throat - gritty and dirty and stifling.
Through the window, across the street and through the trees, the sun had just come up. But the thick smoke provided a natural viewing filter, so that you could see the sun, hovering, a dull burnt red-orange orb surrounded by dry and dying branches. It was natural, yet looked unnatural. Part of the eternal life cycle of the Australian bush, yet hauntingly surreal.
It shimmered, but did not provide adequate illumination for a bright and hot summer's day, Total Fire Ban. Everything was aglow with the orange light - the parched dead grass, the parked cars, dirty from the buildup of fire particulates, the dusty leaves, the bitumen on the road, still warm from the previous day's scorching temperatures.
Her eyes opened in wonder as she learned the truth: That's the sun, I say. Another image, another experience, another first.
So, I thought, UFOs at the age of five. Let's go and de-bunk this one.
It was so innocent, that she had not seen the sun before. (Not since she was about 2, and was at the beach, and saw a sunset, with the sun sitting just above the horizon at the end of the beach, and started walking along the beach because she wanted to go and see the sun). This was different though, and so reasonable - because it did not look like the sun.
Standing inside, looking through the window, the house smelling of smoke that had blown here from hundreds of kilometres away, and a dull haze in all directions - obscuring the view like a thin fog. You could feel the particles in the air, breathing them in, caught in the nose and the throat - gritty and dirty and stifling.
Through the window, across the street and through the trees, the sun had just come up. But the thick smoke provided a natural viewing filter, so that you could see the sun, hovering, a dull burnt red-orange orb surrounded by dry and dying branches. It was natural, yet looked unnatural. Part of the eternal life cycle of the Australian bush, yet hauntingly surreal.
It shimmered, but did not provide adequate illumination for a bright and hot summer's day, Total Fire Ban. Everything was aglow with the orange light - the parched dead grass, the parked cars, dirty from the buildup of fire particulates, the dusty leaves, the bitumen on the road, still warm from the previous day's scorching temperatures.
Her eyes opened in wonder as she learned the truth: That's the sun, I say. Another image, another experience, another first.