The Alchemy of Summer
Today is the first day of summer, a day I dreamed of just four months ago when I had to put on an igloo-of-a-down jacket just to fetch some food (perfectly illustrated by the meme below inspired by a 1980s Schultz drawing).
It’s the point at which the sun sits the highest in the sky – literally over our heads – shining its brightest and most brilliant solar power upon us, who are thus vitalized.
Bonfires were prevalent in traditional celebrations of the solstice. The flames were fed, symbolically giving more strength to the sun, knowing that it will eventually wane with time as the cycles continue.
Our mystical hearts are fired up, too, at the possibilities of the season and I’m always personally awed by the alchemical nature of summer.
Children finish school around this time and, in just a few months until they begin again, grow tremendously, just like the tomato plants I recently transported from their seed starters to the soil that will nourish the Galahad and cherry tomatoes I will harvest in August.
Something evolves within me too these next months and I am different by summer’s end.
On this first day of summer, I caught both the winds of barbecues and sounds of an ice cream truck. I looked out into the expanse of an ocean (actually, “the narrows” between Brooklyn and Manhattan) and wondered what possibilities lie in between, in these short but very meaningful months.
What will you grow under the sun?
