Why would anyone keep their home so gloomy when free sunlight was readily available? 

MY grandparents lived in the dark. Literally. Born in Germany, they made a short stop in Italy as they escaped Hitler’s clutches, and after ten years in La Paz, Bolivia, they turned finally to the United States, settling, like so many Jewish immigrants, in New York. In those days of incandescent bulbs, lighting a room came at considerable cost. Leaving a room without shutting the lights was simply verboten in Oma and Opa’s apartment.

But even with the lights on, the rooms seemed dim, with no discernable difference between day and night. I attributed this darkness to the situation of their living quarters. Theirs was a ground-floor apartment, generally a highly coveted commodity. But their building was built on a hill, so while the windows of some rooms were at eye level, in other rooms the windows were too high for anyone to reach. No wonder it was permanently dark.

After my grandparents passed away, my father took over their apartment, redecorated, and moved in. He threw open shades all around. And lo! Sunlight suffused every room. I was aghast. I couldn’t understand it; my grandparents had chosen to live in the dark. I’d never seen a window shade open when they were there. I didn’t even know the windows were there; I’d assumed we were too far underground.

For years, this perplexed me. Why would anyone keep their home so gloomy when free sunlight was readily available? I could not conceive an answer to the mystery.