On the nature of time: Seasons of the Year

I've written on this before, in my personal journal. I've discussed it with others. Now, I write it here for others to see, and to think about.

[Please note that I write this in North America, in the region known as New England in the United States of America. My writing about the names of the seasons and the dates that mark them are from that perspective.]

Seasons. We are bound by our perception of seasons, which many of us see as unchanging and ever changing, coming full circle during the course of a year back to where we started.

Summer begins on this date, and Fall on that date. We celebrate the coming of Winter on this date, and Spring comes at the same time each year.

But old terms get in the way of our clear understanding of the cycle of the seasons. Someone mentions Midsummer or Midwinter, and our image of the seasons cannot sustain it. How is it that we say that Summer begins on the day of the Summer Solstice, and then also hear/read/say that the Summer Solstice is also called Midsummer? How can Winter begin on Midwinter's day?

Consider the Welsh language. The word Gorffennaf, "July", is derived from gorffen + haf, meaning "the end of summer".

Think of Summer, the season that we are now in (regardless of how you might divide up the year). If you use the definition of Summer that is used most often in North America, then the day of the Summer Solstice is the first day of Summer. This is the "astronomical" definition of Summer.

Does it make more sense to mark Summer as beginning on the day with the longest period of sunlight, or would it make more sense to mark Summer as the days that, together, have the longest period of sunlight? If the Summer Solstice marks the beginning of Summer, then there are almost as many total hours of sunlight in Spring as there are in Summer.

If you think of Summer as the warmest period of the year, rather than the period with the most light, then June, July, and August make the most sense in North America on average (this year appears to be an interesting exception so far in our region). This definition appears to be divorced from the astronomical orientation of the Earth to the Sun (it's not, but there is an offset caused by the lag in the warming of the land mass following the solar cycle), but is important from an agricultural point of view to know when the warmest period will be. This is the "meteorological" definition of Summer.

I prefer to use the definition of the seasons that include Summer Solstice as Mid-Summer, and the Winter Solstice as Mid-Winter. Autumn, the season of the harvest, contains the Autumnal Equinox at its heart rather than at its beginning, as does Spring, the season of rebirth, the Vernal Equinox. The seasons change on the so-called "cross quarter" days, February 2nd, May 1st, August 2nd, and November 1st. Those days are harder to find and define by the sun's position than the solstices and equinoxes, of course.

Sometimes, too, I think of the seasons as being eightfold rather than fourfold, divided by the equinoxes, the solstices, and the cross-quarter days. Each of those periods has its own character, by how plants grow, thrive, and mature, how the temperatures fluctuate, growing colder or warmer, how the rains or snows come, gentle or with great force.

I pay attention to the meteorological seasons, because it's important to know which period will likely be warmest, and which coldest, and which somewhere in between.

We celebrate the turning of the seasons, each in our own way, even if we don't agree on when each season begins or ends. The year turns, the days begin to grow shorter again, heading towards the day when the day and night are the same length and beyond.

May the season be good for you and yours.

Carw Gwynt