It happened today. "June Grass" has started. A certain special few days each year, just before the first cutting of hay; the pinnacle of the bloom of the youth of the year. A time that is neither still spring nor yet summer. A promise and yet delivery of that promise. Heaven incarnate. Ok, Ok I suppose I wax a bit too poetic, but this is the ultimate for me. It truly is my heaven, the place I go to in my dreams. Though still bound somewhat by the calendar, (there are those, however, who would say I have no concept of time and space) I no longer wear a wristwatch. Though daily life must still bow to hourly schedules, I prefer to mark the seasons, at least, by the movement of the sunrise along an eastern ridge, by the progress of the life cycles in nature, some shorter than our own, some longer, but none less important.

For most folks, summer is marked as officially beginning at the summer solstice. However, for me the solstice is the peak - the beginning of the slow slide into autumn. Rather than a start, it is a mid-point of sorts. Summer actually begins much earlier. Which (alas dear reader) brings us back to "June Grass". This is a magical time, a blending of the seasons. I refer to it by the quality of the grass, but really, it is much much more. The grass itself, or more specifically the hay I suppose, has full, nearly ripe seeds on top; in fact it is a bit top heavy. witness the oft mentioned "seas' of grass of poems and other purple prose (such, I suppose, as this). But this season, otherwise unnamed, is marked by color and a feeling of the light, the air, the soul. A time of commencement, a beginning and yet a time to pause and reflect before getting on with the business of life, the productive summer of our year.

I am raking mulch when it comes over me. Jake showing off in an oak tree for my beautiful fiance, Kelly. Elizabeth is alternating time between her book and luxuriating in the sun. I pause to breathe in the curly breeze, and notice the waves in the pasture. Monet never had such light to work with. Cezanne's Provence gave only a glimpse. The sky is so blue you can see the depths of space. It is "June Grass" time, and I am already in my heaven.


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