when it looks like nothing.

the (faintest pink) northern lights.

In the family group chat the other night, my sister (who lives farther north) asked if we could see the northern lights in Nashville. It was cloudy where she lives, but the geomagnetic storm was strong enough to push the aurora farther south, so we should’ve been able to see the lights here—at least through a camera lens.

I was in church when she texted, but when I left, I held my phone up to the sky to try to catch a glimpse of the lights. I noticed that no one else in the parking lot was looking at the sky, and I wondered if they knew—or didn’t care.

It was chilly that night, and I realized I didn’t know which direction was north. Plus, I was surrounded by buildings. So I hopped in the car and decided to try again when I got home. My street runs north to south, so I snapped a photo (seen above) from the middle of the street when I got out of my car.

Honestly, I didn’t really expect anything to show up. It’s hard to believe something is there when you can’t see it. But then I saw that pink. The faintest pink—but PINK. I was so delighted.

Immediately, my mind shot back to the people who left church, walked outside, and didn’t look up. How many people was I in the parking lot with who didn’t see the northern lights because they didn’t have the right lens? Or maybe they did, but they didn’t know to look?

Earlier that night, the pastor had mentioned how the world is never really quiet because the Earth is always humming—but at a frequency too low for us to hear. It seems quiet, but it isn’t. He talked about how God might seem quiet, or still, but He is always moving in the Earth. Always working. Always speaking. The Earth knows it. But can you see it? Can you hear it?

I keep thinking about what the sky looked like with my own eyes compared to the sky I saw through my camera lens. I was cold. I was tired. I felt a tiny bit crazy holding up my phone to a seemingly ordinary night sky. But more than all of that, I wanted to know: What if something’s there? And it was. I’m so glad I didn’t miss it.