It’s Summer Solstice week

By week’s end, days will no longer be getting longer, but the sun will govern and joy should prevail, because we are in the light half of the year. The longest day of the year is accompanied by the shortest period of darkness. Locally, Summer Solstice occurs on Wednesday, June 21, 2023 at 9:57 am CDT. We’ll enjoy 15 hours, 40 minutes, and some seconds of daylight. Day’s length will be almost twice night’s. Both meteorological and astronomical seasons will again be in accord. Everywhere in the Northern hemisphere will be summer for the next ten or twelve weeks or so. Since the odds are at least fair that next winter may be as harsh as the last one, I’m going to make a Summer Solstice resolution to replace complement whatever I did for New Year’s. I will spend as much time as possible enjoying whatever I can for the rest of this year. I doubt I’ll ever be able to forego finding fault with contemporary culture, but I can work on letting go of my disgruntlements much quicker. That way I can return to feeling gruntled much quicker.

One of the presents I received for Father’s Day is among the most delightful books I’ve ever read. It was a special present from my two-and-a-half-going-on-three year old granddaughter. The title is maybe, by Kobi Yamada, illustrated by Gabriella Barouch. (Although the linked review claims it’s a “Picture book. 2 – 8,” we respectfully disagree. We know many too many adults who would enjoy the book and could learn lessons as powerful as those in The Boy, the Mole, the Fox and the Horse.) I look forward to sharing it many times over with my granddaughter. I hope you will get your hands on a copy and read it at least once.

Granddaughters

By Joy Harjo

I was a thought, a dream, a fish, a wing 

And then a human being 

When I emerged from my mother's river 

On my father's boat of potent fever 

I carried a sack of dreams from a starlit dwelling 

To be opened when I begin bleeding 

There's a red dress, deerskin moccasins 

The taste of berries made of promises 

While the memories shift in their skins 

At every moon, to do their ripening

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