Kept in the Dark

I'm one of the few folk that don't automatically hit the light switch when entering a room. I check first whether extra light is needed, and only if I really can't see does the light go on. (I also tend to take energy saving into consideration, as everyone's constantly complaining around here that we "have no money")

Which is why I'm considered weird at work. I never switch on my office light.

As I type this it's dark-grey outside and my office seems a black hole compared to the brightly-lit passages and the spaces of others. But I did start today out with a headache, and bright light ain't gonna help that.

Besides, I prefer a natural lightening of my environment (when the sun chooses to shine) to one where the spotlights throw you immediately into blinding wakefulness.

Some days it stays dark in here for ages, and people walking past stop to switch on my light to make sure it works - at which point they are emphatically urged to switch it off again and leave me in the dark.

My computer screen glows brightly - that's all the light I need, and most of my work is done on that machine anyway.

But it's not just the office light I'm on about here. I switch off lights wherever I go - after everyone's left the building at the end of the day, as I arrive and find the night-lights still burning, whenever I see an empty room with lights ablaze. I've been told electricity here costs us R80,000 a month! I'm sure if everyone hit the switch on their way out (and turned off their computers/aircon overnight), we could bring that cost WAY down.

So today I sit in the dark as the rain pours down the windows. And I love it.