August should be my favorite month. It's a slow month, and I love slow. I adore every Leo I've ever met. Here in DC, August is as quiet as the week between Christmas and New Year's. Congress is in recess so the energy is calmer. Everybody takes off for a little while or a longer while, to the beach, a lake in Vermont, the barrier islands off N. Carolina, or locations more and less exotic, like home to Wisconsin to visit with family. There's not much traffic, restaurants and stores are less crowded. It's mostly just the locals who stick around. Like I said, I should love it.
Historically, though, August has never been my happiest time of year. After Labor Day I begin to thrive again, but the last dregs of summer are challenging. Though not too humid today, usually the month of August features the worst of the humidity, toxic air and plain old heat. The mosquitoes get especially ferocious towards the end of summer, when their days are numbered. And, too, there's the fact that the light is decreasing. Beginning right around the first of August, the waning of the light is noticeable. Palpable, too. You can almost feel the daylight slipping through your fingers.Maybe that's why I always think of the Hanged Man from the tarot when August rolls around. The Hanged Man is not a happy camper, no matter how holy he is. In August, I feel like the Hanged Man, kind of down in the mouth, as they say.
As if to confirm the hanged man energy of this time of year, some guy decided to stand on his head in Lincoln Park this afternoon, just as I was taking a walk during a break at work. He stayed put long enough for me to get this nice picture of him. Oh yeah, it's August.
OK. So, it's August and I'm a little bit depressed. What else is new? This year I'm trying as hard as I can not to mope around. September will be here soon enough. Buck up, Reya, buck up!
15 comments:
That's a pretty impressive headstand for someone who is obviously not a kid.
I spent the afternoon at the dog park with Jake who had to fetch every tennis ball on the ground after he head slobbered on it. I keep wondering why we bother to go to the dog park because he pays no attention to any of the dogs, just the tennis balls.
August is the dog days of summer, always.
Great cloud shot. I looked at it and immediately sat a joust - two riders on horseback about to collide. I was wondering if you saw the same thing as you wrote "Buck up" which is like a horse bucking.
Signed Curious :)
A joust? That sounds fun - more fun than August, that's for sure. When I took the pic, it was to capture the only clouds in the sky because yesterday morning the sky was completely clear for the first time in awhile. Wild Blue Yonder, don't you know? Then I saw the two tiny clouds who do look like they're about to collide. I love cloudomancy. Love it!
Barbara, the dog park gives Jake a different setting to chase balls within. It's good for him, it is.
What a happy sight - the man doing a headstand in the park! And LOVE the clouds. Hope the month gets better...
Yes, I see the jousters. Also a cell dividing. Cool thoughts up your way from down here . . . also hot, and heading to 100 later this week.
it is going to be 108 here today
with high humidity
a/c in car not working
so i can fully comprehend and
totally appreciate your view
of August
in the sun
My prayer for August is always,
please G-d, get me to the fall
Fall is my fave season.
Love you
Love the posts
Love the pics
Love you
It usually takes me until August to realize that my favorite season is almost over. Then I spend September and October trying to keep that summer feeling of relaxation going while everything starts back up. I usually take a bunch of "this could be my last chance this year" day trips to the beach, desperately trying to extend the season. I've been in the ocean as late as Halloween. Maybe I should just give up and say Fall is my favorite seaon, at least for the beach it is!
Cute little twin clouds -- airborne companions. :)
Our August is starting out cool. I always think of August as the time when the pool starts to cool down (unfortunately) and to me that's the sign that summer is already on the wane. Where did it go? I guess it must be because of what you said, the days are getting shorter ...
September has seemed hotter for the past two years than August has. Backward seasons?
Hey now; you can accomplish quite a lot when merely HANGING AROUND.
Didn't Odin (Wotan?) dream up the elder futhark/runes whilst hanging from that old ratty tree? Ygdrasil? Axis Mundi? Somthin' like that there?
Sure it's a bit uncomfortable up there, pierced by his spear & such, but there was a payoff at the end, yeh?
Like Ogalala sun-dancers. Now THERE'S a good hanged-man reference: A one-to-one chat with God, suspended from a cottonwood.
As for Leo, of course we're the AWESOMENEST. Just like a bloody Leo to say such a thing, right?
You are the awesomenest, you ARE!
the clouds look like a cat and dog to me. cat on left facing front, dog looking at cat.
Love your suspended person in the park.
On The Hanged Man...
"The Fool settles beneath a tree, intent on finding his spiritual self. There he stays for nine days, without eating, barely moving. People pass by him, animals, clouds, the wind, the rain, the stars, sun and moon. On the ninth day, with no conscious thought of why, he climbs a branch and dangles upside down like a child, giving up for a moment, all that he is, wants, knows or cares about. Coins fall from his pockets and as he gazes down on them - seeing them not as money but only as round bits of metal - everything suddenly changes perspective. It is as if he's hanging between the mundane world and the spiritual world, able to see both. It is a dazzling moment, dreamlike yet crystal clear. Connections he never understood before are made, mysteries are revealed.
But timeless as this moment of clarity seems, he realizes that it will not last. Very soon, he must right himself, and when he does, things will be different. He will have to act on what he's learned. For now, however, he just hangs, weightless as if underwater, observing, absorbing, seeing."
Sounds like good stuff to me.
Oh. That is exactly where I'm at this summer, learning the soul retrieval. Wow, thanks lacochran!
i like the hanged man exposition - and your photo of the handstand man.
hope you are feeling brighter dear.
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