Photo: Carl Jones via Flickr & Creative Commons
“The season is over. The last tour runs tonight. Although, it is supposed to rain.”
She looked at me with big goldfish eyes, enunciating each word in a thick Nordic accent.
I landed in Reykjavik at dawn. It was the middle of the night west coast time. As the tumblers in my brain fell around attempting to reassemble things I figured that another night without sleep couldn’t hurt.
It would be a fun experiment. Besides, even if it was the end of the season it was worth even a sliver of a chance to catch the elusive lights in all their fiery glory.
“Okay, in.” I said.
“The 9 o’clock tour is fully booked. How’s 11pm?”
I nodded quickly before changing my mind, pushing my credit card across the counter decisively – the way I did last week when purchasing a questionable pair of boots for the trip, knee-high with fuzzy balls dangling from the front and menacing plastic teeth covering the soles.
“Okay,” She clicked around on an ancient computer with one of those old Sony Trinitron monitors.
Click click click.
I drummed my fingers on the desk in response, American style.
I was tired yet simultaneously on edge, a newly adapted state of mind. At this particular snapshot in time I was fully immersed in life – happily taken over by my day job, working on a novel, taking two online classes, and in the thrilling, dizzying first months of a nascent relationship way worth investing in.
“Yep, I can get you down for that.”
Here’s the dark side to all of this. I hate going on adventures. I grumble pretty much every time I’m about to cross time zones or even traverse town. I have to pry myself from my desk, pull myself from bed, remove myself from my peaceful environment and get into the car, bus, train, or plane in pursuit of some obscure unknown.
The thing is, I always say yes to opportunity. I have absolutely no problem booking things. Airbnb and Hopper are among my favorite apps. I harbor an intense love affair with airports and a close relationship to my credit card.
I always say yes because it points me in the direction of the next move. After all, having experiences is far better than having things (even weird-looking boots) but at least I can walk the path in something comfortable. Which again is part of the problem.
Each move leads to the next destination, and then the process repeats.
(Observational note: Lately I’ve been working on leaning into the chaos rather than working against it. Good fodder for another time?)
Anyway, maybe it’s this duality between cynicism and optimism, grumpiness and adventure that inspired me to take a twenty minute nap before the tour was scheduled to begin. Twenty minutes turned into twenty-five, which turned into thirty.
At 10:59 I threw on three additional layers of clothing and ran downstairs clutching a halfway charged iPhone. I neglected to notice that I left my wallet, water bottle and passport back in the hotel room.
Wiping at bleary eyes I boarded the bus. The first people I saw were D and J from our writing group. At first I wanted to hide – slump into a seat, stare out the window, and continue my nap.
For social reasons I thought better of it and plunked myself down in a seat directly in front of them. D waves enthusiastically. “Hi!” Her spark lights the interior of the cavernous bus.
I smile, and for the first time feel at home in this strange, cold country. It’s funny how connections made in the darkest of the night can swiftly evolve into friendships for life.
The engine starts up and the door begins to unfold into a closed position. The moment before we begin to pull away another person from our group comes running out of the hotel.
Frank climbs the stairs, chest heaving. “Sorry I’m late.” The four of us smile at each other and settle into our seats, pleased to see another familiar face added to the mix.
At that point we had known each other for less than twenty-four hours. Already, the group felt like family – bonding to each other like tacky putty, known faces smiling uncertainly in an unfamiliar country.
Our tour guide S was a stocky native with cokebottle glasses. She possessed a quick wit and equally quirky sense of humor. We liked her immediately.
A guide for the last five years, S became a specialist on the Northern Lights tour two years ago. In that time she “became a bit obsessed” (her words), going out twenty-seven days a month in the hopes of seeing them.
“It’s not a bad thing to be obsessed about,” she’d later say. “I go out here in the middle of the night rather than be at home in my cosy bed.”
After a few hours of driving we arrived at Þingvellir National Park.
We bundled up and waddled outside where the temperature hovered above zero degrees celsius.
And then, it was time to wait.
As we passed the time, we learned that two of our fellow adventurers were there celebrating birthdays. No one knew the second person’s name but we proceeded to sing Happy Birthday to him anyway, replacing his name with “mmhmmm” at the part in the song where the person’s name is sung.
We booed loudly as other cars approached us with their headlights trained on our area. Didn’t they know that our eyes need to adjust to the darkness in order to increase the chances of seeing anything, ever, at all?
D found a place to set up her camera while J and I roamed the parking lot.
“Look!” Someone suddenly yelled, breaking the wintery silence like the shattering of glass.
And there, without announcement or declaration, the elusive and mysterious northern lights made themselves visible. Fading in faintly on the horizon, the soft green lights created smooth, silky lines across the inky night sky.
The dance was about to begin.
Small streaks of white eased into view, gently vibrating and taking momentary command of the night sky. The lines faded across the smudgy edges of the horizon as new ones quickly took their place.
“Over there!” Someone called out.
On the other side of the horizon vertical streaks were now visible, green brushstrokes of light emanating against the midnight blue – vibrant smudges moving across the sky like minty charcoal.
Fading in, manifesting in strength then fading out, the lights created full streaks of color across the night sky. They increased in intensity and before we knew it there were massive ribbons zig-zagging above us, in front of us, on all sides.
We were completely immersed in cosmic light.
From the flat horizon on one side to the mountains on the other, colorful bows of light arced across – folding, jumping, mirroring directly above us.
Green faded into blue then purple and gray and sometimes red, a mash of everything as the light from the sun hit the earth’s magnetic field then touched fingers with oxygen particles in the atmosphere.
We danced beneath them, jumped up and down, hopped from side to side. Some people clapped, others wooo’ed, some shrieked and even cried.
I looked up, instinctively threw my arms out and leaned back to take it all in – to hug the sky and let the magic cleanse us, to let whatever it was rid us of the things that kept us tethered to monotonous ritual and the side effects that left us brimming with cowardice.
Every single star in the sky was twinkling, and I felt free.
In that brief moment I wasn’t even in my body. My life force was being witnessed from the inside out, liberated from its physical structure, running wild.
My spirit was dancing with the colors now rearranging themselves in unusual blocky patterns directly above us (“like families,” J said, “like a ballet,” I said).
They were the color of smoke, then fire, moving slowly then fast, up then down, raining down on us in streaks of magic chalky white.
We stayed in the park for an hour before the lights began to fade and we were no longer able to feel sensation in the fleshy part of our cheeks.
As we re-boarded the bus someone said “Look, the mountain is on fire!”
We turned. Sure enough, the dark mountain was backlit by an ethereal green glow. The color projected mightily into the sky, putting a thousand Hollywood spotlights to shame.
When we returned to the hotel we witnessed one last streak of green running from the front of the hotel across the rear of the building. It glided quietly, softly reminding us, healing us.
It filled us with all that is good and great about the universe that we are only so lucky to catch a glimpse of – if we’re simply willing to take the chance.
“Thank you,” the three of us said in unison.
Frank came running over. “Where were you?!” We ask. “It was dark!” He said as he extinguished the butt of a cigarette with the sole of his boot, rubbing his hands together for warmth.
As we waddled back inside, the last of the lights began to dim. We were back to where we once began.
It was as though nothing had happened. Yet somehow, everything had changed.