It feels like summer but it’s still only late spring. Temperatures in the high 80s and mid 90s are almost too much too bear. But we keep telling ourselves that it will cool down, and feel like spring again. It has even been too hot for the new fawns so emerge from the shelter of woodland trees.
We keep getting promises of thunderstorms to cool things down, but the morning sun is as bright as ever and there are few clouds in the sky. But those of us in the northeast are fortunate-- we haven’t yet had the triple digit temperatures of the Southwest.
Just as we sometimes wonder what our ancestors did in the freezing cold of February without central heat, we wonder what they did in the burning sun of summers. There is a difference between climate and weather, but there’s no question that our summers have on the whole become hotter. And heat can kill more than plants.
Prayer for the Day
We feel the morning sun, pushing light and opening us to the day,
Pushing through the mist and warming even the darkest caves;
We feel the morning air with its promise of the day to come,
And the gentlest of breezes waking us to your day.
Eternal Creator, grant us the wisdom to care for the earth
And to live in gratitude for the creatures you have made.
In the name of him for whom we are most grateful,
Even Christ Jesus our Lord, Amen.
Thoughts for the Day
No matter how chaotic it is, wildflowers will still spring up in the middle of nowhere.
Sheryl Crow, American songwriter
Nothing is so beautiful as spring – when weeds in wheels, shoot up long and lovely and lush. Thrush’s eggs look little low heavens, and thrush through the echoing timber does so rinse and wring the ear, it strikes like lightening to hear him sing.
Gerard Manley Hopkins, British poet (1844-1889)
Let us know, let us press on to know the Lord; God’s appearing is as sure as the dawn;
God will come to us like the showers, like the spring rains that water the earth.
Hosea 6: 3