The turning of the wheel

Dragon Mood? -- excitement & anticipating

I drove to the city late last night. It was 10:23 p.m. according to my car clock and there was still light in the western sky. The sky was a deepening blue and the moon was a svelte crescent high above the remaining light. Looking straight up, I could see stars.

I felt excited witnessing the ever-so-slight turning of the wheel of the seasons, with the sun one day shy of its longest (Earth) day for the year. I wanted to share this with someone! I called Yosh and babbled about the excitement of Midsummer's Eve. He patiently listened.

After we got off the phone, I listened to the BBC, via a regional NPR station. They reported from Stonehenge that it was 3:30 a.m. GMT and there were approximately 17,000 to 20,000 people gathered there to witness the first rays of sunlight striking the "heel" stone in that acient circle on the Summer Solstice. Oh, I wanted to be there!

Even though I was raised Lutheran (sometimes I refer to myself and my family as "dyed in the wool"), there is a part of me that appreciates and identifies with these ancient, pre-Christian rhythms of the seasons and of nature. The sun, the moon, the predictable rotations of the seasons-- they all feel as much a part of my being as those menstrual cycles which occupied my existence for almost forty years.

Waves, ebbs and tides, waxing and waning -- all part of the same circle, patterns within cycles, turning, revolving, over and over. There is comfort in such a predictable cycle, the sun returning to its same point in the sky, on this particular day, year after year. The ancients celebrated it and we, even with our vast and arrogant technologies, can celebrate it too. Thankfully, and I do give thanks, this day still holds mystery and excitement for me.

Happy Summer Solstice, everybody!