Here in the dark part of the year, the lack of daylight can be depressing. Rise in the dark, eat breakfast in the dark, have a few hours of light, then eat dinner in the dark, go to bed in the dark … And even during the day, shadows are long, and the frost lingers in every chilly pocket of the yard. The trees across the road cast shade on my office windows for much of the day, so even the sunny side of the house can feel dark.

But the low angle of the sun in winter comes with its own beauty. While my office is mostly shaded, the trees don’t provide complete shade. Shafts of sunlight track across my office as the sun moves. An antique chandelier crystal my husband bought me years ago catches the sun’s rays and fills my office with thousands of rainbows that appear and disappear throughout the day, shimmering on the white walls and ceiling and splashing across the floor. 

In summer, the sun is too high to hit the crystal—it’s shaded by the eaves. I could hang the crystal lower, so it made rainbows all year, but I like to think the rainbows are winter’s gift to me. They’re something to look forward to during these short days.