Welcome to Tuesday, May 19, 2026. Today, the sun rises at 5:45 AM and sets at 9:06 PM, giving us a generous 15 hours and 21 minutes of daylight. The preceding night lasted just 8 hours and 39 minutes, a brief pause in the long, bright days of late spring. This is day 139 of the year, and we are firmly in the season of growth and lengthening light. It has already been 149 days since the winter solstice, and we are 126 days away from the autumnal equinox, meaning we are well past the longest day and now heading, however slowly, toward the equal balance of fall.

Since the spring equinox, we have gained a total of 411 minutes of daylight, a dramatic shift from the balanced twelve-hour days of March. Today’s daylight is still increasing, but at a more leisurely pace: the sun is rising two minutes earlier and setting two minutes later than it did yesterday, for a net gain of four minutes. It is as if the sun, having sprinted through spring, is now settling into a comfortable jog, adding a few minutes here and there before it begins its slow retreat toward autumn.