The Wheel Keeps Turning

Monday is the Summer Solstice - well, Monday at 7:29am to be exact for our location. It is a special day - it is the longest day and shortest night of the year. After Monday, our days begin to get shorter again and keep doing so until the Winter Solstice in December.

With each solstice, equinox, and some of the other seasonal year markers like May Day and Halloween, I take note of the specialness of the day. It makes me feel different. It makes me feel part of something bigger and I guess I am since I am a passenger on our great Mother Earth as she makes another circle around the Sun.

Depending upon the season I celebrate the day in different ways - for May Day, I visit a park and enjoy the Spring wildflowers and the regreening of the Earth. For the Winter Solstice, I go outside at night and let the quiet stillness of Winter and the icy, twinkling stars fill me. And since the Summer Solstice is all about the Sun, I rise as early as I can to greet the Sun as it sets off to make its journey across the sky.

Our ancestors throughout history and throughout the world have also taken special note of these times as well. Not only did they take note, but they built markers, monuments, and sacred sites to note our yearly path around the sun and other astronomical events. They created giant calenders and celestial observatories made out of stone, wood, and earth - some of these surviving to our modern day.

The ancient Britons built Stonehenge, Newgrange, and others. The Mayans built the pyramid "El Castillo" at Chitzen Itza where shadows on the Fall and Spring equinoxes make the "serpent come down from the sky." And many others throughout the ages and around the world including those created by Native Americans. The picture above is of Medicine Wheel in Big Horn County, Wyoming. It is a precolumbian stone structure known as a "medicine wheel" and it is one of many such structures throughout North America that were built by Native Americans. The Bighorn Medicine Wheel is also one of these ancient stone and earth calendars. It marks the Summer Solstice as well as the rising of the stars Sirius, Aldebaran, and Rigel. And without a doubt, this site will herald in the Summer Solstice this upcoming Monday.

So while you may not have Stonehenge in your backyard or the Bighorn Medicine Wheel around the corner, the Sun will rise above your home just the same as these special places come Monday. Rise early. Greet the Sun and be thankful for the Sun's warming rays. Be thankful for being a passenger on the great yearly trip around the Sun once more. Be thankful for all the blessings that are yours. And if you have a special place in your yard or garden, take 2 sticks. Push one into the ground. And as the Sun breaks the horizon Monday morning, line up the Sun, the first stick and the second stick. Push the second stick into the ground. Later find two special rocks and replace the sticks with those rocks. They will mark not only the Summer Solstice for you all year long but the blessings you have to be thankful for as well.

-kim