I've always wondered what you call people who had the opposite of
SAD, because that's me. And then, voila, there I am reading The Morville Year (sequel to the lovely The Morville Hours by Katherine Swift, about a British woman who restores a garden at a beautiful country home) and this pops up:
"I sometimes think that, like the peacock
butterflies, I undergo a period of diapause in late summer—defined by
my Collins Field Guide to Butterflies as 'a period of suspension of
activity or development.' The more familiar form of diapause is
hibernation (from the Latin word for winter). Midsummer diapause is
called aestivation (from the Latin
'aestas,' meaning summer), and is defined as 'a state of torpor in
summer heat or drought.' That's me, all right. People who suffer from
SAD syndrome (Seasonal Affective Disorder) have the opposite problem:
they experience a waning of vitality and lowered mood at the onset of
winter, a condition linked by some doctors to an atavistic need to
hibernate. Where as at the first nip of frost my spirits start to soar."
Aestivation. That's me, all right, too! So when I'm miserable in summer, it's a real thing. I'm aestivating.
Showing posts with label summer. Show all posts
Showing posts with label summer. Show all posts
09 October 2019
25 August 2019
Please Take My Sunshine Away
I tell myself each year, in the spring, that this year it's going to be different. Since there's nothing I can do about summer, I need to at least make up my mind that there will be no whining and complaining this year. If I can't really enjoy the season, perhaps I can just accept it as it is, even as I go dodging from air-conditioned home to air-conditioned car, setting the controls on "afterburner" so I can endure the ride, and then sprint across a parking lot to an air-conditioned store. Acceptance is the answer.
Acceptance to summer is not my speed. I can't help but after a few weeks of high 80s-lower 90s, to start the litany again: Summer sucks. Summer sucks so much it should be renamed "Hoover." (I've been told that that's very old-fashioned. Okay. Summer sucks so much it should be renamed "Roomba.") The sun gives me headaches, or a rash, or both. In rare cases it has given me heart palpitations, but always too long out in the sun I can hear my heart start to beat like the big bass drum in the circus parade: BOOM BOOM BOOM. It shakes me until I run inside and sit under a fan, waiting for it to return to the quiet lub-dub. I'm chivvied out of my bed early to walk the dog before the sidewalks turn into griddles, the asphalt stinks, the air smells of car exhaust. I can't see the appeal of sitting all day on a beach under a broiler whose fire makes my skin burn and prickle. So most of this summer, especially when temps climbed into the high 90s, I kept my head down and prayed for autumn.
Last night a wind blew down out of the north and we woke to mid-60s temperatures. It so invigorated me I walked the dog an extra quarter mile and, while we did keep a brisk enough pace for me to break a sweat, it wasn't the usual one where even my underwear became sopped. As soon as I was inside, I threw open a few windows and opened the door to the deck and turned on a couple of fans.
Out the living room window I saw this. The tulip trees, at least, are longing for autumn. Too, the scuppernongs growing wild out on the main road have grapes swollen to size, and now ripening and falling. The oaks are already host to browning leaves that are dropping. Other bushes have leaves turning yellow, or even drifting off every few seconds, like the down when Snowy moults.
Look at that tulip tree sporting its saffron spots. The plants know summer is waning—I wish the weather would figure it out! I long for cool temperatures and cool breezes, weather cold enough to snuggle in flannel and fleece, wearing a robe and fuzzy slippers, eating gingerbread and sipping peppermint-spiked hot chocolate. Weather where you feel comfortable, not attacked. A chill that keeps the mosquitoes (a big problem this year!) away. Wander off, O summer, where the odd ones want you: down to Florida and all those inexplicable lookalike Caribbean resorts that are giveaway prizes on Wheel of Fortune. Sail away...even better, jet away. Wish you could stay there for good, too.
Acceptance to summer is not my speed. I can't help but after a few weeks of high 80s-lower 90s, to start the litany again: Summer sucks. Summer sucks so much it should be renamed "Hoover." (I've been told that that's very old-fashioned. Okay. Summer sucks so much it should be renamed "Roomba.") The sun gives me headaches, or a rash, or both. In rare cases it has given me heart palpitations, but always too long out in the sun I can hear my heart start to beat like the big bass drum in the circus parade: BOOM BOOM BOOM. It shakes me until I run inside and sit under a fan, waiting for it to return to the quiet lub-dub. I'm chivvied out of my bed early to walk the dog before the sidewalks turn into griddles, the asphalt stinks, the air smells of car exhaust. I can't see the appeal of sitting all day on a beach under a broiler whose fire makes my skin burn and prickle. So most of this summer, especially when temps climbed into the high 90s, I kept my head down and prayed for autumn.
Last night a wind blew down out of the north and we woke to mid-60s temperatures. It so invigorated me I walked the dog an extra quarter mile and, while we did keep a brisk enough pace for me to break a sweat, it wasn't the usual one where even my underwear became sopped. As soon as I was inside, I threw open a few windows and opened the door to the deck and turned on a couple of fans.
Out the living room window I saw this. The tulip trees, at least, are longing for autumn. Too, the scuppernongs growing wild out on the main road have grapes swollen to size, and now ripening and falling. The oaks are already host to browning leaves that are dropping. Other bushes have leaves turning yellow, or even drifting off every few seconds, like the down when Snowy moults.
Look at that tulip tree sporting its saffron spots. The plants know summer is waning—I wish the weather would figure it out! I long for cool temperatures and cool breezes, weather cold enough to snuggle in flannel and fleece, wearing a robe and fuzzy slippers, eating gingerbread and sipping peppermint-spiked hot chocolate. Weather where you feel comfortable, not attacked. A chill that keeps the mosquitoes (a big problem this year!) away. Wander off, O summer, where the odd ones want you: down to Florida and all those inexplicable lookalike Caribbean resorts that are giveaway prizes on Wheel of Fortune. Sail away...even better, jet away. Wish you could stay there for good, too.
25 September 2018
Seeking Autumn...
Alas, summer's claws are still painfully entrenched...but there is hope, even after a dreadful few weeks when the weather decided it had not yet given us enough of stifling, appallingly heavy air pulled like thick lint into the lungs and sizzling rays that touched skin with tongues of fire, and laid upon us temperatures in the 90s to torture us further. Now storms are drifting in from the south, flattening temperatures into the tedious 80s and adding humidity to the mix.
Sadly, the only two singular things about this summer have been that I discovered a traditional "Scotch thistle" plant, with its unique purple head, blooming at the side of the main road, and that I have seen more butterflies this year than I have seen in this neighborhood in ages: big yellow butterflies that skirt the tops of cars as they dash by, saffron daredevils with gossamer wings; medium-sized brown butterflies with their upper wings tipped in white as if they have been skimming cream from the tops of unpasteurized milk bottles; and small black butterflies who dart in and out of backyards and around heads, and zoom by the nose of an uncurious terrier. Indeed, Tucker is not into botany or entomology, as evidenced when I noted a virtual exodus of caterpillars from flanking rows of overgrown cedar bushes alongside a neighbor's driveway, determined black creatures with fetching red "racing stripes" setting off down the sidewalk as if on a mission, and he studiously ignored them to pee on a weed.
Still, a few weeks ago, while once again walking the dog, I was astonished to see fallen leaves out under one of the trees at the front of our subdivision. Tall chocolate-trunked trees with small elliptic leaves and peeling bark had left a carpet of crunching brown and green-flicked-with-yellow scattered upon the concrete sidewalk, banking up against the compact bushes at the foot of the trees, caught between their shiny, waxy green leaves. I picked up one leaf that was ruddy-speckled and practically breathed "autumn" to me, despite the constant drone of the cicadas. Checking overhead I could see that the two spindly oak trees out front were already showing signs of browning leaves and on the opposite side of the entrance, insect-speckled maple leaves dotted the ground under their tree trunks.
And suddenly, within a day of the appearance of the leaves, the constant rising-and-falling sough of the cicadas went silent. I trod early in the morning on my long walk to avoid the heat, skirting the sun as a vampire does, but they did not return, leaving the morning sounds to the intermittent songs of the birds and, more constantly, the fiddling of the crickets. There seem to be two kinds of crickets, one group that sings the regulation, rhythmic song of individual chirps that can be counted, the others with a sweeter, higher-pitched hum that make a constant song like a lullaby. One longs to open the window and doze to their siren sound, but it's still too smothery, too sticky, too summer.
Now I can't turn to the right or left without spying some sign of an autumn valiantly trying to arrive, like the trio of trees up at the corner that have already lost their leaves, as if they are declaring, "Look, it's time we got some sleep. I don't care what temperature the sun has made it!" Or an entire empty lot scattered broadside with tossing gilded heads of goldenrod bobbing in the backwash of car exhaust. The view out the dining room windows that shows new yellow leaves popping out every day on the tulip trees. The slim leaves of the dogwood trees turning rusty as if they were left out too long in the rain. The heady scent of mulching leaves slowly accumulating under the trees trying to outdo the odor of broiling asphalt at midday.
It's so close, it's so close I can almost taste it: gingerbread, hot chocolate, apple cider. Almost feel it: soft sweatshirts, cold breezers, wind that makes you feel alive. Almost see it: leaves of gold and tangerine and bronze and scarlet, bare branches of trees, bright blue sky that hurts the eyes.
Go away, summer. You've had your miserable stinking sizzle. Let us have our joy back. Please?
Sadly, the only two singular things about this summer have been that I discovered a traditional "Scotch thistle" plant, with its unique purple head, blooming at the side of the main road, and that I have seen more butterflies this year than I have seen in this neighborhood in ages: big yellow butterflies that skirt the tops of cars as they dash by, saffron daredevils with gossamer wings; medium-sized brown butterflies with their upper wings tipped in white as if they have been skimming cream from the tops of unpasteurized milk bottles; and small black butterflies who dart in and out of backyards and around heads, and zoom by the nose of an uncurious terrier. Indeed, Tucker is not into botany or entomology, as evidenced when I noted a virtual exodus of caterpillars from flanking rows of overgrown cedar bushes alongside a neighbor's driveway, determined black creatures with fetching red "racing stripes" setting off down the sidewalk as if on a mission, and he studiously ignored them to pee on a weed.
Still, a few weeks ago, while once again walking the dog, I was astonished to see fallen leaves out under one of the trees at the front of our subdivision. Tall chocolate-trunked trees with small elliptic leaves and peeling bark had left a carpet of crunching brown and green-flicked-with-yellow scattered upon the concrete sidewalk, banking up against the compact bushes at the foot of the trees, caught between their shiny, waxy green leaves. I picked up one leaf that was ruddy-speckled and practically breathed "autumn" to me, despite the constant drone of the cicadas. Checking overhead I could see that the two spindly oak trees out front were already showing signs of browning leaves and on the opposite side of the entrance, insect-speckled maple leaves dotted the ground under their tree trunks.
And suddenly, within a day of the appearance of the leaves, the constant rising-and-falling sough of the cicadas went silent. I trod early in the morning on my long walk to avoid the heat, skirting the sun as a vampire does, but they did not return, leaving the morning sounds to the intermittent songs of the birds and, more constantly, the fiddling of the crickets. There seem to be two kinds of crickets, one group that sings the regulation, rhythmic song of individual chirps that can be counted, the others with a sweeter, higher-pitched hum that make a constant song like a lullaby. One longs to open the window and doze to their siren sound, but it's still too smothery, too sticky, too summer.
Now I can't turn to the right or left without spying some sign of an autumn valiantly trying to arrive, like the trio of trees up at the corner that have already lost their leaves, as if they are declaring, "Look, it's time we got some sleep. I don't care what temperature the sun has made it!" Or an entire empty lot scattered broadside with tossing gilded heads of goldenrod bobbing in the backwash of car exhaust. The view out the dining room windows that shows new yellow leaves popping out every day on the tulip trees. The slim leaves of the dogwood trees turning rusty as if they were left out too long in the rain. The heady scent of mulching leaves slowly accumulating under the trees trying to outdo the odor of broiling asphalt at midday.
It's so close, it's so close I can almost taste it: gingerbread, hot chocolate, apple cider. Almost feel it: soft sweatshirts, cold breezers, wind that makes you feel alive. Almost see it: leaves of gold and tangerine and bronze and scarlet, bare branches of trees, bright blue sky that hurts the eyes.
Go away, summer. You've had your miserable stinking sizzle. Let us have our joy back. Please?
04 July 2017
24 June 2016
04 July 2013
24 June 2013
Midsummer's Day
I'm in my usual hibernation for the summer, but still a word about Midsummer's Day.
Despite the name, Midsummer's Day is celebrated a few days after the summer solstice. It's especially popular in northern countries that experience long winters. Shakespeare's play A Midsummer's Night Dream references the celebratory practices of Midsummer Eve and Day.
Midsummer Day in Sweden
Midsummer's Day
Midsummer Day in Lithuania
Midsummer Day and the Summer Solstice
Midsummer Day Images
Midsummer Day takes place on the Feast of John the Baptist.
The history of St. John.
NewAdvent.org history of St. John.
Best of all, tomorrow makes six months until Christmas. I could never understand why they have "Christmas in July" when the end of June is the halfway mark. :-)
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