I have a little shadow that goes in and out with me,
And what can be the use of him is more than I can see.
He is very, very like me from the heels up to the head;
And I see him jump before me, when I jump into my bed.
That’s the first stanza from “My Shadow,” in which the poet Robert Louis Stevenson immortalized the idea that our shadow can think and act separately from our bodies. It’s a whimsical concept to muse about, but we all understand the impossibility of a self-acting shadow.
This past summer my granddaughter and I were playing a shadow game as we walked along through the woods. When the trees hovered over the path, our shadows were nowhere. But when the sunlight filtered onto the path, we would try to jump on each other’s shadow. It kept my four-year-old companion busy for much of the walk.
