the sky sometimes does not get dark at night. why?

[wicked witch of east]

ok. sometimes the night sky is dark (black), you can see stars and stuff. you cant see where you are going if you walk around out there. other times it is weird because you can still see the sky sort of lighter (more of a grayish) sometimes you can even still see the clouds against the light sky like at twilight (the time of day not the dumb book). you can see just fine when you walk around. i have tried to come up with all sorts of logical explanations but none pan out. first obviously i thought it was the moon light. but the lighter sky was there still when the moon was in the new moon faze. so that wasn't it. then said it must be that the sun has not set all the way, but this is not the case either because on one night at 2am it was dark and the very next night at the very same time 2am it was twilight looking. i then said, ok it must be a big stadium or a building with massive lights but i went and looked and found nothing. it is not just in one city either. once i was in a completely different state and it still happened. other people have seen this twilight light and comment on how strange it is
what is going on?? are we all retards or it there some sort of weird astronomical conspiracy??