Confusion reigns
This is a strange time of year. A strange one and a confusing one. I’ve always found it so at least. Confusing that is. For as long as I can remember. And you’d have thought, given my Pagan leanings, that I wouldn’t. Wouldn’t you? Find it confusing that is.
Lemme explain.
21st June today. Or it will be, once daylight breaks (there’s my Pagan leanings peeking out again!).
And I love June, for all sorts of reasons. Not least of which is cos its Summertime. Right bang in the middle of Summer in fact.
Or is it?
For this is where the confusion begins.
In the tradition I follow (and have done for much of my adult life) 21st June has marked the Summer Solstice, and celebrated as Midsummer’s Eve.
A tradition borne out in fact by such an august body as the Royal Botanic Garden of Edinburgh.
Midsummer’s Eve you’ll note. Midsummer. Which says to me “the middle of Summer”. Not the end; not the beginning; the middle. Hence the “mid” part of the word.
And that seems to make perfect sense to me. For its also the longest day; from hereon in the days start to get shorter. And the nights, by some strange coincidence, start to get longer.
But that middle of Summer business… that’s precisely where the confusion starts to creep in.
For some people insist that June 21st is actually the beginning of Summer! How totally bizarre. And confusing.
And if that’s the case why isn’t it called Begsummer rather than Midsummer? Just doesn’t make any sense.
So much so that this year I decided to try to pin this down once and for all by doing a little bit of research… dunno why it had never occurred to me before. But now I’m rather sorry I did for if anything its left me even more confused.
Here’s one answer:
June 21 marks the beginning of summer in the northern hemisphere and simultaneously heralds the beginning of winter in the southern hemisphere. In 2009, the solstice occurs and summer begins in the Northern Hemisphere summer begins early on June 21, at 1:45 a.m. EDT (5:45 UTC).
And here’s another:
Astronomically, the summer solstice is 21st June, but tradition throughout Europe reckons 24 June as Midsummer Day, and calls the night of 23/4 Midsummer Eve, Midsummer Night, or St John’s Eve, since 24 June is the feast of St John the Baptist.
which source also describes it as:
1. The middle of the summer.
2. The summer solstice, about June 21.
See why I’m confused? And this is to say nothing of that 24th June business beginning to creep into things and muddy the waters even more.
As I say, confusing.
That’s not the end of the matter though. Oh no!
Having said that I love June, and this particular part of June, I must now say that I also find it incredibly depressing (told you its confusing!).
For its not just the middle of Summer (yep, that’s my interpretation, and that’s what I’m sticking to); its also, as I said, when the days start getting shorter.
And that, to me, is an incredibly depressing prospect. It seems to take so long to move out of Winter (as you may by now have guessed, I really don’t like the cold, or the short days… which is also weird given that I’m very much a night creature) and then, suddenly, bingo! We’ve begun the all-too-rapid slide back into Winter again. Nasty!
So yeah. A confusing time. A lovely time. And a depressing time.
As I said at the start, a strange time of year.
