St. Magnus Cathedral, Kirkwall, Orkney

To be awake at 4 a.m. when you don't want to be awake, when you want to be sleeping, is the like the difference between seeing a church in the light and in the dark.

St. Magnus Cathedral is the most northerly cathedral in the British Isles. Its construction began in 1137 by the Viking, Earl Rognvald in honor of his uncle Saint Magnus, and it was added onto over the next three hundred years.

Its aspect changes dramatically at night, especially when photographed from a different angle.

When I'm wake at 4 a.m., which is all too often I'm sorry to say, it's nice to have the extra time all to myself and it's extremely quiet, a good time for thinking. Since I've already buried everything that happened in the daytime, I'm free to bring things up again and look at them in a wholly different light.

But I'd really much rather be asleep and dreaming of a strange little island town way up north in a time when there were still saints and men and women who honored them, if there ever was a time like this, that is.