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Posts from December 2010

Of the moon

Ourmoon Our inseparable companion ... / Holiday window painting, Umberto's Clam House NYC

"Next to the sun, the Moon is the most splendid and shining globe in the heavens, the satellite, or inseparable companion of the earth. By dissipating, in some measure, the darkness and horrors of the night, subdividing the year into months, and regulating the flux and reflux of the sea, she not only becomes pleasing, but a welcome object; an object affording much for speculation to the comtemplative mind, of real use to the navigator, the traveller ..."

~ Astronomical and Geographical Essays: Containing a Full and Comprehensive View, On a New Plan, of the General Priciples of Astronomy; The Use of the Celestial and Terrestrial Gloves, Exemplified in a Greater Variety of Problems, than are to be Found in any Other Work; ... by George Adams, Mathematical Instrument Maker to his Majesty, etc., 1803


Every hour of the day

Solstice_sunspot Solstice_moonspot

Solstice sun-spot (top): this morning the sun came in the back window, traveled down the stairs, across the room, and lit up the corner like a burning bush. / Solstice moon-spot (bottom): I went walking at 5 PM, looking, looking for the moon which was nowhere to be seen until I rounded the corner and walked right into the smiling glow of the man in the moon, rising at the end of the street.

"The magic of the starry heavens does not fail with the decline of the sun in winter, but, on the contrary, increases in power when the curtains of the night begin to close so early that by six o'clock the twilight is gone and the firmament has become a dome of jet ablaze with clusters of living gems.  ...  When the earth is locked fast in the bonds of winter the sparkling heavens seem most alive."

~ Round the Year with the Stars by Garrett P. Serviss, 1910


Where the sun at his setting

Solsticecandle On this solstice day we anticipate revival, the beauties of spring, the rich fruits of autumn

"From the oblique position of the ecliptic, the earth continually presents a different face to the sun, and never receives his rays two days together in the same direction. In the day and night, the differences are so obvious, that they need not be mentioned, though they are most remarkable in those climates, where the sun at his setting makes the greatest angle with the horizon. Every hour of the day, the heat varies with the sun's altitude, is altered by the interposition of clouds, and the action of winds; and there is little room to doubt, but what the varous changes that thus take place, concur in producing many of the smaller and greater phenomena of nature.

Be this however as it may, it is certain that the various irregularities and intemperature of the elements, which seem to destory nature in one season, serve to revive it in another: the immoderate heats of summer, and the excessive cold of winter, prepare the beauties of spring, and the rich fruits of autumn. These vicissitudes, which seem to superficial minds the effects of a fortuitious concourse of irregular causes, are regulated according to weight and measure by that SOVEREIGN WISDOM, who weights the earth as a grain of sand, the sea as a drop of water."

~ Astronomical and Geographical Essays: Containing a Full and Comprehensive View, On a New Plan, of the General Priciples of Astronomy; The Use of the Celestial and Terrestrial Gloves, Exemplified in a Greater Variety of Problems, than are to be Found in any Other Work; ... by George Adams, Mathematical Instrument Maker to his Majesty, etc., 1803


Their lively ministrelsy

Decemberbirds Christmas-tree birds / Dec. 2009

“On December 9 one of these birds trilled in a clear, resonant tone. On the 13th it was the low, sweet warble again. On the 19th — a warm, bright day — the song sparrow regaled me again with his lively ministrelsy.”

~ Leander S. Keyser, Bird Songs Out of Season, 1891


Imagine all the people

Guitarhands Remembering December 8, 1980 and John / Dec. 2004

I was a senior in a college in New Jersey typing yet another sociology paper on my clunky old “portable” typewriter (yes, it did buckle into its own carrying case, but, because of its weight it was like carting around an anchor). It was late in the evening — a Monday, I think. The little black and white TV was on in the background. Suddenly newscasters broke into the broadcast to announce that John Lennon was dead. The moment is seared into my memory. The Beatles always seemed like a mythical group to me as I was too young to appreciate them in their heyday. Their music was funny, wise, harmonious, uplifting, thoughtful. That one of them who incessantly preached peace (and had such a wonderful sense of humor) could have died in such a violent manner just up the turnpike from my college didn't seem possible. It didn't seem fair. It just wasn't right.

I was thinking last night about how the world has changed in the past 30 years. There were no 24-hour cable news channels, no internet sites to check for details, no email or cell phone or text messaging to contact friends. You were left in your own surroundings with your own thoughts and feelings about what had happened. The girl who lived across the hall from me, Joanne (a smart, efficient biology major from a town in north Jersey that I'd never heard of), was visibly upset by the news. And the memory of her emotion has stuck with me much longer than the incessant recitation of facts and video feeds that we get on any of our media devices today.

Sadly, we seem to be no closer to the peace that John Lennon imagined. I find myself wishing he was here to lead “bed-ins” and peace rallys. To challenge the pundits with his wit. To be a guiding light. But maybe his example is for we who are here: what can each of us do every day to promote the cause of peace?