Aging Summer Brings The Hunter And His Big Dog

Orion the Hunter

Back in the '70's and '80's I had the good fortune to live on the beach of a small barrier island at the mouth of the Savannah River. My house was a raised Caribbean-style cottage built in the 1920s. The porch overlooking the Atlantic faced southeast and was ideal for capturing the summer trade winds. At this time of year when I looked toward the horizon I saw a beautiful event unfold many times in the hour before dawn. Those hours and the imaginary music of the spheres evoke memories so vivid they seem to have occurred only yesterday.

First, Bellatrix, a blue giant star rose out of the Atlantic haze to be followed soon by the red giant, Betelgeuse. Soon the blue giants, Mintaka, and Rigel followed. At this point viewers saw a signature belt of three stars and a faint sword. Experienced sky watchers knew that Orion the Hunter was ascending. In minutes the belt stars pointed to shimmering Sirius, a binary star also known as the Dog Star. It was by far the brightest star in the sky but soon it and all the others would dissolve in the blinding light and heat of another summer sunrise.

Sirius the Dog Star

In the Nile and other valleys of the ancient Middle East, all eyes turned to the summer dawn anticipating the appearance of Orion and Sirius. They signaled the coming of the floods, of water for life and eventually for civilization. We have come a long way in time since scribes first recorded Sirius rising from the damp mud along the banks of the Nile. But we still experience the Hunter and the Dog, now both lost in daylight, one awaiting his turn to rule the autumn sky, the other to remind us that his days, the sultry dog days, are still with us.

While some people dread them I look forward to the coming of the "dog days." The heat makes me thrive and my arthritis becomes a memory. Atlanta's climate data tells us that on average the warmest days of 2023 will be behind us in a few weeks. The sun is already casting ever longer shadows as it arcs lower across the southern sky. Leaves hang limp on trees catching more and more of that light giving the woods a golden hue even at midday. The aging summer has also brought this year's acorn crop closer to maturity. I can tell because the squirrel community in our woods is starting to work overtime on an early and ripening harvest.

Calm days and high temperatures also lead to popcorn thundershowers that meander across the region waiting to die out as fast as they arise. So far they've brought powerful lightning, the positive strikes that start fires, several inches of rainfall, high winds, and pea sized hail. With that said it's time to envision sitting comfortably on the screened porch where a big ceiling fan quietly generates a steady breeze and your sweating sweet iced tea feels good even to the touch. The forest surrounding me is a still landscape interrupted by an occasional bird or squirrel. If you stay there long you witness the yellowing light of day giving way to the twilights, the lightning bugs, the cicadas, then the katydids and a chorus of north Georgia tree frogs.

I love all of those twilight sounds but I love the katydids most. They remind me of long summer vacations and drifting to sleep in my bed next to a cottage window that opened wide to both their chatter and a comforting breeze moving down the West Virginia mountainsides of my childhood. It was there I first developed a passion for forests, for flowing water, for a clear sky I felt I could almost touch. Over sixty year later that passion leads me to waken before the sun to witness a pattern of stars rise out of an unseen ocean and bring me summer. Bring it on!