A Time When Dogs Seek Shade

 

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. To the ancient Greeks the rising of these stars with the sun signaled the peak of summer heat when even dogs chose not to leave shade. They came to call this time of year hemerai kynades, a phrase that translates directly to "dog days." 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!

The Hunter Rises From The Sea

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!

From Northern Lights To Summer Sprites

Sprites                  Lomonosov Moscow State University

Earlier this month a large part of the US was treated to the best display of the northern lights in decades. We're not likely to see a show like that again this year but a forecast for thunderstorms this afternoon reminded me that it's time to mention another spectacular atmosperic event, the sprites. A sprite is a member of a family of upper atmosphere lightning phenomena called transient luminous events or TLE's. They actually occur rather frequently in a split second and are visible to the naked eye. Other members of the TLE family include blue jets and elves. All are associated with thunderstorms and although reports of sightings go back centuries they were unknown to science a little more than a generation ago. Digital photography and advanced computer technology enabled both their imaging and analysis beginning around 1995. 

Source: Centre Nationales D'Etudes Spatiales

I find these atmospheric events fascinating, beautiful, and mysterious but the probability of observing them in real time is practically nil. I have yet to see one in person. For certain I won't be seeing anything from my woodland home in Georgia or the eastern U.S. for that matter. When you find yourself in a thunderstorm-rich location with unlimited visibility beyond the horizon you have found the ideal conditions for LTE observation. In other words, our readers in Oklahoma, Texas, and other wide open spaces need only step out on the porch and into a comfortable chair to enjoy the possibility of seeing a rare and still mysterious show in the distant sky.

Below is an amazing video by the quintessential storm chaser, Pecos Hank, and the world's leading TLE photographer, Bill Smith. They are also credited with the discovery and naming of a new TLE they called the ghost. It's ten minutes of breathtaking photography and excellent instruction in what could be a complex subject for non-science folks. I can only hope the high standards of science instruction found in this video is in every classroom in the US.

In this brief video Pecos Hank documented the TLE activity over Texas on May 17, 2021, when he witnessed his "most incredible sprite storm...to date." As a weather observer for seventty years I can so appreciate his enthusiam on seeing such an amazing phenomenon.

These videos are but a small sample of Pecos Hank's award winning work focused on super-cell thunderstorms and tornadoes. If you enjoy weather science and storm chasing combined with high production values his You Tube channel is your destination.


Keep looking up!

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!

The Sprites And Ghosts Of Summer's Fire In The Sky

Sprites                            Lomonosov Moscow State University

A forecast for potentially severe thunderstorms this afternoon reminded me that it's time to mention the season of the sprites. A sprite is a member of a family of upper atmosphere lightning phenomena called transient luminous events or TLE's. Other members of the TLE family include blue jets and elves. They are associated with thunderstorms and although observed earlier were unknown to science a little more than a generation ago. Digital photography and advanced computer technology enabled both their imaging and analysis beginning around 1995.

                        Centre Nationales D'Etudes Spatiales

I find these atmospheric events fascinating, beautiful, and mysterious but the probability of observing them in real time is practically nil. I have yet to see one in person. For certain I won't be seeing anything from my woodland home in Georgia or the eastern U.S. for that matter. When you find yourself in a thunderstorm-rich location with unlimited visibility beyond the horizon you have found the ideal conditions for LTE observation. In other words, our readers in Oklahoma, Texas, and other wide open spaces need only step out on the porch and into a comfortable chair to enjoy the possibility of seeing a rare and still mysterious show in the distant sky.

Below is an amazing video by the quintessential storm chaser, Pecos Hank, and the world's leading TLE photographer, Bill Smith. They are also credited with the discovery and naming of a new TLE they called the ghost. It's ten minutes of breathtaking photography and excellent instruction in what could be a complex subject for non-science folks. I can only hope the high standards of science instruction found in this video is in every classroom in the US.

 

In this brief video Pecos Hank documented the TLE activity over Texas on May 17, 2021, when he witnessed his "most incredible sprite storm...to date." As a weather observer for seventty years I can so appreciate his enthusiam on seeing such an amazing phenomenon.

 

These videos are but a small sample of Pecos Hank's award winning work focused on super-cell thunderstorms and tornadoes. If you enjoy weather science and storm chasing combined with high production values his You Tube channel is your destination. 

Keep looking up!

Winter 2022

In a few hours winter arrives in Atlanta. That event as well as the drizzle and an afternoon temperature of 42 degrees is more than enough to awaken thoughts of sub-freezing temperatures, howling winds and depths of drifting snow measured in feet. Much of the nation won't have long to wait for that weather. By Christmas weekend an Arctic blast will drop temperatures to near freezing on the edge of tropical Florida. Atlanta is likely to experience its third coldest Christmas on record.

Personally I don't look forward to cold temperatures, ice, assorted freezing slop, and black snow lining city streets for the next two months. On the other hand, the thought of lengthening days that arrived with today's solstice brings a big smile to my face. This rebirth of the sun has brought happiness to humans for quite a long time.

The Newgrange Tumulus in County Meath, Ireland, is a nice illustration of this long-standing respect for the rebirth of light and warmth to a culture. The burial mound has a passage that aligns perfectly with the winter solstice sunrise. People have observed the illumination of the keystone at Newgrange long before Stonehenge and the Giza pyramids existed.

For the next six months the sun will climb a bit higher every day in the Northern Hemisphere. We won't notice heat from the "rebirth" of the sun until a month or so into this cycle. While the lengthening days can give us hope that the "dead season" will soon come to an end, we can still enjoy the experience of a world at quiet rest.

Sources

Photos and Illustrations:

Newgrange aerial photo, gaia.com
Newgrange plan and section, public domain illustration, William Frederick Wakeman, Wakeman's Handbook of Irish Heritage (1903), archives.org

Greeting Orion In The Dawn At The Edge Of The Sea

 

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 his 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.

Orion the Hunter

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's arrival in 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 2021 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!

Hurricane Season (June 1 - November 1) 2022

 

Well, it seems the first official day of this year's hurricane season has two systems boiling off the Yucatan and Florida coasts.  The Yucatan disturbance shows a high probability of developing as it moves north toward southwest Florida. Here in Atlanta we can tell the tropics are restless because all those puffy cumulus clouds are coming our way on a northeast wind. In fact I can almost feel the sea breeze at Tybee Island.

Tybee Island, Georgia. My home for several years

Indeed, it appears our coastal neighbors will have to contend with some wet and windy weather by week's end. That also means a good chance of beach erosion and rip currents on the barrier islands along the Southeast Bight. 

Confidence is high that we'll experience more tropical systems between now and the end of the official season on November 1. With that in mind the following information should be useful.

For more information on hurricane science and forecasting visit the National Hurricane Center website.

Sources

Photos and Text:

tropical outlook and two charts, National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, Department of Commerce

 

Observing Fireworks At The Edge Of Space

Sprites, Lomonosov Moscow State University

With more and more thunderstorms rumbling across the country it's time to mention that we have entered the season of the sprites. A sprite is a member of a family of upper atmosphere lightning phenomena called transient luminous events or TLE's. Other members of the TLE family include blue jets and elves. They are associated with thunderstorms and although observed earlier were unknown to science a little more than a generation ago. Digital photography and advanced computer technology enabled both their imaging and analysis beginning around 1995.

Centre Nationales D'Etudes Spatiales

I find these atmospheric events fascinating, beautiful, and mysterious but the probability of observing them in real time is practically nil. I have yet to see one in person. For certain I won't be seeing anything from my woodland home in Georgia or the eastern U.S. for that matter. When you find yourself in a thunderstorm-rich location with unlimited visibility beyond the horizon you have found the ideal conditions for LTE observation. In other words, our readers in Oklahoma, Texas, and other wide open spaces need only step out on the porch and into a comfortable chair to enjoy the possibility of seeing a rare and still mysterious show in the distant sky.

Below is an amazing video by the quintessential storm chaser, Pecos Hank, and the world's leading TLE photographer, Bill Smith. It's ten minutes of breathtaking photography and excellent instruction in what could be a complex subject for non-science folks. I can only hope the high standards of science instruction found in this video is in every classroom in the US.

 This video is one of many on Pecos Hank's You Tube channel. If you enjoy weather science and storm chasing combined with high production values Pecos Hank is your destination.

Keep looking up!

This Season Brings The Summer Wind

 

North Beach sunrise, Tybee Island, Georgia

With a cool, damp, and sometimes stormy weekend behind us, folks in the Southeast are watching a perfect prelude to hurricane season unfold offshore. For a few days a storm off Cape Hatteras churned winds and waves into the Mid-Atlantic shoreline as far north as New Jersey. Overnight that storm began moving south along a decaying front. That movement brought us beautiful weather and light easterly winds to north Georgia today. By the weekend the storm should be somewhere off southeast Florida and weakening . . . or not. We are after all on the threshold of the trade winds and a new hurricane season.

In coastal Georgia, the trades usually creep in softly around the middle of May. They bring in the high cirrus and horsetails as well as the puffy fair-weather cumulus clouds that race over the beach. The clouds sweep inland twenty miles or so where they meet the uplifts of daily heating enhanced by the incentives of an onshore flow. Often, the result is a brisk and exciting line of thunderstorms sometimes extending from the city-state of Charleston to the Players Club fairways at Ponte Vedra Beach. In Savannah, the 3:00 pm showers are so predictable you can almost set a watch by them. When residents advised me an umbrella was a summer essential they weren't fooling. The city's collapsing thunderstorms produced some of the heaviest perpendicular rainfall I've witnessed.

For eleven years I worked at the mouth of the Savannah River and watched the light show ten miles west over Savannah arcing north and east toward Hilton Head Island. Occasionally land breezes swept in early and pushed the storms over me. Such a magnificent show. After a brief evening calm the steady land breeze resumed only to be replaced in the early morning hours with a quiet wind off the water. That wind embraced the island in salt-saturated humidity and a haze that turned golden with a full sunrise. The Boat-tailed Grackles skirmishing in the oleanders nearby served as a natural alarm clock during the ten years we lived on Tybee Island. I do miss the birds, but not their alarm clock role.

The trade wind days last into September to be replaced by weeks of spectacular warm, dry, cloudless days, cool nights and warm water lingering into November. Of course, the occasional tropical storm can interrupt the coastal idyll that is the norm on the sea islands. It is to be expected and respected by those who share the fragile boundary of life at the ocean's edge. In Atlanta we'll sometimes enjoy the remnant sea breezes that survive the 200 mile journey from the Atlantic. It is a welcome reminder of the joy of coastal living.

It's A Rainy Day In Georgia

True shape of a raindrop

Flood Watch, Severe Thunderstorm Watch, Tornado Watch. Take your pick. Most of Georgia is covered in an overlay of potential weather watches issued before dawn and likely extending well after dark. Now that a few waves of torrential rains and lots of positive lightning strikes - the fire starters - have passed through the flash flood warnings are coming. 

I'd like to say this is a typical spring event but it's not. It's a damp cold, about 20 degrees below normal and time for a warm all day fire in the den. I want to look on the brighter side of this dark, wet, and cold day especially considering last night's amazing basketball tournament final - congrats, Kansas - this weekend's Masters in Augusta, and a Maryland men's lacrosse game on Saturday. Given all those pluses here's another one in the form of a song about rain and why, deep in our souls, we cherish it.

Cloudburst is sung in Spanish and based on a poem by the Mexican writer, Octavio Paz. Here is a translation:

The rain . . . 
Eyes of shadow-water
eyes of well-water
eyes of dream-water.
Blue suns, green whirlwinds,
pecks of light that open
pomegranate stars.
But tell me, burnt earth,
is there no water?
Only blood, only dust,
only naked footsteps on the thorns?

The rain awakens . . . 
We must sleep with open eyes,
We must dream with our hands
we must dream dreams of active rivers
Searching for their cause
Dreams of the sun dreaming of its worlds
we must dream aloud,
we must sing till the song
casts roots,
trunks, branches, birds, stars,
we must unearth the lost word,
and remember
what the blood, the tides,
the earth, and the body say,
and return to the point of departure

Stay warm today. Check out the Masters this weekend - the azaleas should be in full bloom. Check out the Maryland lacrosse game - Big Ten Network.

 

Sources

Photos and Illustrations:

Goddard Space Flight Center, National Aeronautics and Space Administration

Winter 2021 Arrives

 

Earlier today winter arrived in Atlanta and the Northern Hemisphere. That event as well as the drizzle and an afternoon temperature of 42 degrees is more than enough to awaken thoughts of sub-freezing temperatures, howling winds and depths of drifting snow measured in feet. In fact there's a 325 year-old song - a much older legend as well - where Cupid rouses Cold Genius, the spirit of Winter, to assist King Arthur in a search for his fiance, Princess Emmeline. Cold Genius is not particularly happy being awakened from his icy slumber. It is a surprisingly modern sounding piece of work from the semi-opera, King Arthur, by Henry Purcell and librettist, John Dryden.

What power art thou, who from below,

Hast made me rise unwillingly and slow,

From beds of everlasting snow?

See'st thou not how stiff and wondrous old,

Far, far unfit to bear the bitter cold,

I can scarcely move or draw my breath;

Let me, let me freeze again to death.

Personally I don't look forward to cold temperatures, ice, assorted freezing slop, and black snow lining city streets for the next two months. On the other hand, the thought of lengthening days that arrived with yesterday's solstice brings a big smile to my face. This rebirth of the sun has brought happiness to humans for quite a long time.

The Newgrange Tumulus in County Meath, Ireland, is a nice illustration of this long-standing respect for the rebirth of light and warmth to a culture. The burial mound has a passage that aligns perfectly with the winter solstice sunrise. People have observed the illumination of the keystone at Newgrange long before Stonehenge and the Giza pyramids existed.

For the next six months the sun will climb a bit higher every day in the Northern Hemisphere. We won't notice heat from the "rebirth" of the sun until a month or so into this cycle. While the lengthening days can give us hope that the "dead season" will soon come to an end, we can still enjoy the experience of a world at quiet rest.

At the same time, I have a feeling most of us hope that Cold Genius sleeps peacefully for most of the season.


Sources

Photos and Illustrations:
Newgrange aerial photo, worldheritageireland.ie
Newgrange plan and section, public domain illustration, William Frederick Wakeman, Wakeman's Handbook of Irish Heritage (1903), archives.org

The Hunter Rises Before Dawn

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. My porch overlooking the Atlantic faced southeast and was ideal for capturing the  summer trade winds.  This time of year I watched an event unfold many times in the hour before dawn. Those hours evoke memories so vivid they seem to have occurred only yesterday. 

First, Bellatrix, a blue giant star rises out of the Atlantic haze to be followed soon by the red giant, Betelgeuse. Soon the blue giants, Mintaka, and Rigel follow. We see a signature belt of three stars and a faint sword. Orion the Hunter is ascending. In minutes the belt stars point to  shimmering Sirius, a binary star also known as the Dog Star. It is the brightest star in the sky but soon it and all the others will dissolve in the blinding light and heat of another summer sunrise. 

Orion the Hunter

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 civilization. We have come a long way in time since scribes first recorded Sirius's arrival in 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 2021 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!

Chasing The Ghost Of The Shimmering Summer Dawn

If you look into the northeastern sky before sunrise tomorrow morning you'll see an object, a comet with a tail suspended like a necklace and gem against a steel blue curtain. This month you can also observe the comet in the west after sunset. A double treat. Named Neowise by the astronomers who discovered it in March, the comet is a two-mile wide piece of rock that last visited Earth over 6000 years ago or about 1500 years before the dawn of recorded history. That means our celestial friend will return again in the 88th century.

On an more optimistic note we don't have to wait more than one day for another beautiful astronomical event. This one happens every year at sunrise in July. Back in the '70's and '80's I watched this event unfold many times from my porch overlooking the Atlantic Ocean. Seems only yesterday. First, Bellatrix, a blue giant star rises to be followed soon by the red giant, Betelgeuse, and the blue giants, Mintaka, and Rigel. We see a signature belt of three stars and a faint sword and know that Orion ascends. Not far behind is shimmering Sirius, a binary star also known as the Dog Star. It is the brightest star in the sky but soon it and all the others will dissolve in the blinding light and heat of another summer sunrise.

Sirius, the Dog Star

When Neowise last graced our skies all eyes in the Nile River valley and those of other ancients peoples in the region 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 civilization. We have come a long way in time since scribes first recorded Sirius's arrival in the damp mud along the banks of the Nile. But we still experience the star and the season it announces.

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 2020 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 close to maturity. I can tell because the squirrel community in our woods is starting to work overtime on an early and near-ripe harvest. They litter the patio daily with twigs, leaves, and broken nuts, making for a big mess as well as grilling "under fire."

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, 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 the ocean and bring me summer. Bring it on!

The Dog Days Of 2019

Tonight is the dark night of July's New Moon, actually a night without a visible moon. Here in Atlanta it coincides with what climatologists tell us are the average warmest days of the year. Climate averages aside I can say that today was much warmer than those averages derived from 130 years of observations. The excess was not uncomfortable given the usual pop-up thunderstorms that not only brought rain but also an early cloud curtain that shielded the area from afternoon sunshine. At an elevation of around 1000 feet Atlanta is a reasonable place - the coast is by far the best - to enjoy a hot summer in Georgia. South of the Fall Line running from Augusta through Macon to Columbus the heat can be a serious challenge. There's no better illustration of this than the one-hour drive south from Atlanta to Macon. In that brief time you will drop 550 feet over several ancient river terraces until you arrive five degrees hotter and fully saturated at the Ocmulgee River swamps on the city's east side. It is a place where summer's hottest days are best described in terms of months.

With that said it's time to envision sitting comfortably on the screen 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 across the lawn and garden is a still landscape interrupted by an occasional bird or squirrel and accompanied by countless cicadas and their song of summer.

If you stay there long you witness the yellowing light of day giving way to a blazing sunset, the twilight, the lightning bugs, the katydids, and a chorus of north Georgia tree frogs. I love all of those twilight sounds but I love the katydids most because they remind me of long summer vacations in the mountains of West Virginia and drifting to sleep in my bed serenaded by insects and washed in a cool breeze through a cottage window. 

Also happening outside my window was the rising of the “dog,” the event behind the “Dog Days” of my summer. Having lived most of my life deep in woods or in brightly lit cities, I never made note of the brightest star rising to its highest elevation in the summer sky. Before turning thirty I enjoyed the sky in terms of weather and events including Earth’s moon, meteor showers, comets, and favorite constellations. After eleven years living on a small island at the edge of the ocean things changed. I observed, perhaps literally merged with, the actors on this infinite stage and their cycle of days, hours, tides, seasons, years, and more. No question the experience enticed me. In time I came to know well the dog and his comings and going.

Sirius, the Dog Star, actually a double star

Now when that brightest star rises in the eastern sky, it’s name is Sirius. Twenty-five hundred years ago the Greeks knew the star as Sirius, Sothis, and the Dog Star, the bringer of heat and drought to their rocky hills and islands. A thousand years earlier the Egyptians worshiped the object as the star goddess, Sodpet, whose appearance brought flood waters and new crops to the valley of the Nile River. 

It is a far cry from the beaches of Pelopennese to my humble porch in the woods here in the Atlanta suburbs. And the cloud remnants of scattered thundershowers may likely obscure the Dog’s rise on my horizon tonight. With certainty, I will not be awake for the Dog’s zenith, its highest elevation in the sky. No worry though, for the music of the spheres will perform as expected, God willing. Tybee’s beaches, the Back River, and the beautiful salt marshes east of Savannah will be refreshed with a very high tide. My katydids here and in West Virginia will chatter long into the night. The Dog Days will stay with Atlantans for forty days and Macon will swelter long after Labor Day.

A Full Moon And Full Winter's Day 2018

Today features the first full day of winter in the northern hemisphere as well as December's full moon, the Cold Moon.  That's enough to awaken thoughts of sub-freezing temperatures, howling winds and depths of drifting snow measured in feet. In fact there's a 325 year-old song - a much older legend as well - where Cupid rouses Cold Genius, the spirit of Winter, to assist King Arthur in a search for his fiance, Princess Emmeline. Cold Genius is not particularly happy being awakened from his icy slumber. It is a surprisingly modern sounding piece of work from the semi-opera, King Arthur, by Henry Purcell and librettist, John Dryden . 

What power art thou, who from below,

Hast made me rise unwillingly and slow,

From beds of everlasting snow?

See'st thou not how stiff and wondrous old,

Far, far unfit to bear the bitter cold,

I can scarcely move or draw my breath;

Let me, let me freeze again to death.

Personally I don't look forward to cold temperatures, ice, assorted freezing slop, and black snow lining city streets for the next two months. On the other hand, the thought of lengthening days that arrived with yesterday's solstice brings a big smile to my face. This rebirth of the sun has brought happiness to humans for quite a long time.

The Newgrange Tumulus in County Meath, Ireland, is a nice illustration of this long-standing respect for the rebirth of light and warmth to a culture. The burial mound has a passage that aligns perfectly with the winter solstice sunrise. People have observed the illumination of the keystone at Newgrange long before Stonehenge and the Giza pyramids existed.

For the next six months the sun will climb a bit higher every day in the Northern Hemisphere. We won't notice heat from the "rebirth" of the sun until a month or so into this cycle. While we experience, perhaps enjoy, a world at quiet rest the lengthening days can give us hope that the "dead season" will soon come to an end.

Let us hope Cold Genius sleeps peacefully for most of the season.


Sources

Photos and Illustrations:

Newgrange aerial photo, worldheritageireland.ie
Newgrange plan and section, public domain illustration, William Frederick Wakeman, Wakeman's Handbook of Irish Heritage (1903), archives.org