Last night the Northern Lights cast their spectacular glow across the night sky above Britain. Thousands of people went out to see it, photograph it, revel in the spectacle and the beauty.
Me, I didn’t even bother stepping out the back door. I live in one of the largest urban sprawls in Britain, on the side of the country that catches all that lovely grey weather drifting in off the north Atlantic. Between the clouds and the light pollution not much shows up in the sky around here. So I stayed warm indoors instead.
I imagine the same thing happened before the Battle of Hastings. Sure, some people saw an omen of change tearing through the night sky in the form Halley’s Comet. But plenty more missed it because the weather was rubbish, or they were short-sighted, or they just didn’t have much time to stare up into the sky.
It’s something that’s easily forgotten when you’re writing a story of epic fantasy, that for one reason or another big events will always pass somebody by. There’ll be peasants who don’t know about the dragon in the next valley over, seers who miss the signs, knights who don’t know the latest sword swinging techniques. In sci-fi as well there will be people who miss the meteor strike or don’t realise that Evilcorp owns everyone’s digitised souls.
However many people gaze in awe at the arrival of the rapture, there’ll still be some folks asleep in bed.
Speaking of which I’m pretty sleepy myself and need to meet some deadlines before I head to bed for a long, satisfying nap. Have a great weekend, and try not to miss its great spectacular features, whatever they are.