Tonight at 8:59 pm EDT will be the summer solstice.
We've already had some very summer-like weather this year, temps in the 90s (even up to 103 in Boston!), so this weekend's chance of showers and cooler temperatures makes for a gentler experience of summer. Ah, summer! Cookouts and pagan festivals and bounteous flowers.
Of course this time of year also makes me recall fondly my times spent in England at this time of year, including the memorable trip with B. where we attended the first open summer solstice celebration at Stonehenge in more than a decade. We also went to a private sunrise ritual inside the stones with a druid group that reserved the space; we got to meet Emma Restall-Orr (aka Bobcat) and Greywolf. Also spent time in Banbury (where we attended a conference on sacred landscapes put on by ASLAN), including a night spent sleeping outdoors at the Rollright Stones (where they held a wonderful celebration with the Wild Hunt Morris and Damh the Bard performing) and Glastonbury, where we met some cool people at the King Arthur Pub (which has since been sold to a new owner).
This is one holiday I have not written about for the "You Call, We Call It" series on Witchvox...I guess this would have been a good year to do it. I also have not done one for Lammas, since there is virtually no observance of that day in the mundane calendar...Still, it would be good to have the series be complete.
Todd and I will be utilizing the energy, weaving our handfasting cords for our Big Day next month, and finally opening that nice bottle of Veuve Clicquot champagne our realtor got us for a housewarming gift..and maybe eating a nice juicy steak.
Blessings of the summer sun to you and may your fires burn bright!
4 comments :
Congrats all around!
We're in the 90's and it's "too hot" by 8 am. I was going to take a solstice morning hike, but we will see.
It was brutal here last week but not so bad now...though after a too-dry spring the summer is shaping up to be too rainy...the mulch on my flower beds is going moldy!
Wet here - second miserable summer in a row here. The British climate has shifted to wet, mild summers with the odd heatwave/drought thrown in every few years, and dryish, mild winters without any snow, or, increasingly, any frost.
I recall a very hot, dry summer spell in 1989, when I was living in Oxford...the lawns at Trinity College were like straw, and the gardeners, unused to such weather, did not know not to water them in the middle of the afternoon, so the lush grass got scorched. These hot spells are much more the norm, now, which is sad and scary to me.
Green and pleasant land, gone brown and drab?
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