Dear Elisa,
Those quiet hazy morning reflections have become my favourite moment of the day. Going outside just before the first light of day, feeling that water hanging in the air. A misty cloud that touches the ground.
Morning mist is a poem of nature. I love those foggy, misty, hazy mornings when you are surrounded by magical water dust. In summer and fall. There is something poetic about morning haze. The soft glow and slight obscurity caused by watery dust. When the tiny water droplets give your morning a dreamy quality.
Metaphorically, literature refers to morning haze as a fuzzy state of confusion or uncertainty, a moment of being half-asleep or lacking clarity with regards to the next steps. When we don’t have a clear view of what lies ahead. Fog and mist represent an obscured view.
To me it is much more of a sense of floating in a dreamy cloud of possibilities. It is the haze that makes the sunrise more magical and magnifies the invigorating effect when light from the sun begins to appear in the sky.
Especially in fall, when rays of sunlight become scarcer. And then you get that moment on an early morning in the meadow, when the first glimpse of the sun shines through and shares that energizing feeling.
Fog, mist, haze
Mornings are the coolest part of the day. Right before the sun comes up.
But cold air can hold less moisture than warm air. When air becomes saturated with moisture and can hold no more, a foggy and misty experience emerges.
Fog and mist are made up of tiny water droplets or ice crystals suspended in the air. Mist is less dense than fog. They happen when air cools to the point in which it can hold no more water. This is called the dew point.
When you check the humidity in your weather app, it will tell you the dewpoint. If you want to understand how humid it will be, you need to check the dewpoint more than the relative humidity in percent. The higher the dew point, the more uncomfortable it will feel, you’ll have warm and wet. The closer the dew point is to the actual air temperature, the more likely it is that you'll feel like the air is too humid. But humidity in summer and fall are two different experiences, while summer humidity feels muggy, fall humidity feels mythical.
Fog has been described as a gentle, misty relative of rain; but instead of falling from the sky, it hangs close to the Earth's surface. Clouds and fog are composed of tiny water crystals which reminds me of the frosty mornings that will kick in soon, bringing us tiny frost crystals on grass and windows.
Poems
Every water crystal is a poem composed by nature.
Water has an ever-changing force, depth, and beauty.
All air holds moisture.
We are always surrounded by water.
We are just not always aware of that.
For me, mornings are magical because of the water in the air.
When the world around me is dressed in mesmerizing morning mist.
When the golden dust in the air sparkles as the sun rises.
Haze is technically not composed of water but tiny dusty particles. I prefer the label of morning haze for misty air. I equally love the feeling on a lazy hazy summer day to the feeling on a wintery sunrise morning walk or the Scottish Highlands mist, where you are never sure if it is fog or a slight drizzle of rain that surrounds you. It is the water in the air that makes Scottland to mythical.
Nature connectedness
I believe we need a restoration of our relationship to our waters. Rather than seeing our relationship with nature as connectedness we have moved into a world where we define the natural world as ownership over assets. Who owns our natural resources? Who owns our water? But how can we help people appreciate the poem that nature gifts us on so many mornings, in so many moments surrounded by water?
Water is not just a resource that supports our lives, it is a source of wellbeing and inspiration. It can give us a sense of magic and enchantment. Water has long been inseparable from poetry. Not only for poets and writers cross time, but for each one of us. We take pictures of water, we spend our holidays by water, we refresh ourselves with water.
Even having a shower is not only a physical but also a spiritual cleansing process. Water gifts us a soothing and relaxing experience. It's a moment of reinvigoration and tranquillity. Bathing is seen as a form of meditation or healthy break from our busy schedules.
I found a song called misty waters:
Everything is lovely, In a misty morning glaze. I like misty water, I like fog and haze.
Misty Waters, The KINKS
And there are endless poems capturing water and its journey in the comparison to the flow of a human life. Water inspired poetry and literature capture the essence of water's movement and significance, providing a profound connection to the beauty and of this life-sustaining element.
A great example is the poem “Water” by Ralph Waldo Emerson.
The water understands
Civilization well;
It wets my foot, but prettily,
It chills my life, but wittily,
It is not disconcerted,
It is not broken-hearted:
Well used, it decketh joy,
Adorneth, doubleth joy:
Ill used, it will destroy,
In perfect time and measure
With a face of golden pleasure
Elegantly destroy.
Water touches our lives every day, yet it often goes unnoticed in our busy routines. If we treat water well it will bring us joy. Shared moments provide an opportunity to collectively appreciate the beauty, serenity, and significance of water as an integral part of our daily existence. Water is an everyday presence.
Our interaction with water systems needs to inspire a notion of care in all of us. If we talk about the wellbeing of our people, we talk about the wellbeing of our water.
We need to see water for the sacred entity that it is.
“In the end, our society will be defined not only by what we create but by what we refuse to destroy.”
John Sawhill (Former president and CEO of The Nature Conservancy)
In appreciation of our lazy, hazy water retreat days,
Clouds
Source : Photo by Richard Fullbrook on Unsplash
