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Have you ever, on a cloudless night, looked down from a passing aircraft flying over Canada? Endless, glowing strings of cities, towns, and homesteads. Stretching on and on, one province to the next. With only the stars in the distance.

When I was 15 and playing in Kalamazoo, I ran into a light pole on the side of the court and was knocked out for a little while - when I woke up, I was seeing stars!

There are so many opportunities to see the sun go down in the evening and the sun come up in the morning. The colors change on the trees, on the snow. I'm surrounded by people who are friendly and helpful.

I was brought up in a very open, rural countryside in the middle of nowhere. There were no cell phones. If your lights went out, you were lit by candlelight for a good four days before they can get to you. And so, my imagination was crazy.

Way up high in the Shenandoah Mountains where I live, it is difficult to maintain illusions about the natural world. It is dying.

Once while vacationing at my grandparent's house in Rajasthan, we were sleeping on the roof and I spotted an object hovering around in the sky - kind of a UFO. It totally spooked me out. I couldn't sleep for days after that.

Who among us has never looked up into the heavens on a starlit night, lost in wonder at the vastness of space and the beauty of the stars?

I had not yet gotten into the world of light. But I felt as one who, standing outside, could knock against the wall and hear an answering knock from within.

I am going to notice the lights of the earth, the sun and the moon and the stars, the lights of our candles as we march, the lights with which spring teases us, the light that is already present.