Sun

I have wanted to resend this post, originally sent May 9, 2006, to include this picture since summer began this year. This morning is still dark, and I am sensing fall more than summer.  I did, however, just eat a piece of a sweet nectarine and have every year.   I find the Dorothy Day quote poignant.  You would think we would have given up war by now.

    

When I was a child, my parents took me on a trip through Central Texas one summer.  One early afternoon, they stopped to visit one of their longtime friends. Her husband had died and she lived alone, outside of some town, with her white cat named Sam. We sat in the kitchen and she served us lunch from her garden - tomatoes, corn, and cucumbers. Everything was sweet and very delicious, and I had never had such a lunch in all my young years. She, her large fluffy white cat, and her garden all seemed so mysterious, so complete. I finally understood sun.  

  

This morning is cloudless and as I look towards the ridge that lies on the other side of the freeway, I sense summer drifting this way. I hope we have nectarines this year, but I must wait. Only the trees and the farmers know. 

  

"There is poverty and hunger and war in the world. And we prepare for more war. There is desperate suffering with no prospect of relief. But we would contribute to the misery and desperation of the world if we failed to rejoice in the sun, the moon, and the stars, in the rivers which surround this island on which we live, in the cool breezes of the bay, in what food we have and in the benefactors God sends." 

Dorothy Day: Selected Writings