Welcome the Summer Solstice~

Oak King, by Ann Stokes

I'm not ready to start this blog, but it is the first full day of summer, and the first day of full sunshine that we have had in a long while.  In fact, this has been the most dismal spring I can remember out of the 12 years I've been here. 

Summer solstice is so bittersweet.   The longest days of the year, where the sky is still glowing at 10 o'clock at night.  It's only dark for 6 hours, and then the pre-dawn birds tentatively begin singing around 4am.  Just one at first, then another answers.  The sun wants to linger in the north, and who can blame it?  "Midsummer" goes until June 24th (happy anniversary!)  The days will now grow gloriously warmer as if to purposefully delay an unfortunate realization that usually comes in late August. ...The one that reminds us that being so far north, we gain and then lose light rapidly.  It is a losing battle that doesn't finish for six months. 

But for the next four glorious months the sun bathes us and then wraps us in its honeyed embrace, and for that I am extremely thankful.  

Now is the time for a cold, cold beer, set against a backdrop of my laughing son playing in the sprinkler and the familiar drone of my neighbor's lawn mower.