T'was the Weekend Before Beltaine . . .

. . . Beltaine, the May cross-quarter day and the traditional beginning of summer in the old calendar. And here's what we awoke to . . .







Wet, windy snowfall on Friday morning . . .











Sunday morning, May 2, for crying out loud!
And the Cross-quarter is on Wednesday, May 5.

Maybe this year we will change the name of Sedillo Hill to "Never Summer Hill.











Snow on the rocks and the Agave.
I've seen it flurry here in May, and even June.
But stick?

It must be the Icelandic Volcano.

And maybe this is why although traditional summer begins in early May, meteorlogical summer does not begin until June 1.

That darn volcano--it put more stuff into the atmosphere in a few days than all the hippy-dippy yuppies and their Priuses and string grocery bags took out over the past 5.

Sigh. Anybody got any ideas for Volcano cap and tax?

May Cross Quarter Day

The wheel of the year seems to turn faster and faster as the years go by.



Here is the sunrise from a fixed spot in the meadow looking east taken this morning, at 6: 40 AM MDT.

Tomorrow afternoon (MDT) the position of the earth will be half-way between the northern hemisphere vernal equinox and the summer solstice. On the global analemma, as the seasons progress, the sun appears to be crossing between the equator and the Tropic of Cancer, and at the May Cross-Quarter, it appears closer to the Tropic of Cancer. This is due to the tilt of the earth--which causes the seasonal variations in the time and angle of sunlight.



This is a picture taken on the vernal equinox from the same fixed spot in the meadow looking east at 8 AM MDT. If you compare the two pictures, you can see that this morning (top picture) the sun was rising quite a bit further north of east than it was on the Vernal equinox. It is also rising quite a bit earlier, and setting quite a bit later. Until the summer solstice, the days in the northern hemisphere are lengthening. Around the cross-quarter, the length of the daylight seems to be rapidly changing day by day.



Here is the sunset last night from a fixed spot on the back patio. Just six weeks ago, it was setting well to the left of this spot, near the top of the rise you see on on the horizon at the left edge of the picture. The picture was taken at 7:32 PM MDT. In the last week or two, we have noticed that the light is staying in the sky longer after sunset, too, until nearly 9 PM.

Summer is on the way!





Although, by the Old Calendar, Thursday was Beltaine, which was the celebration of the beginning of summer in ancient Europe.

But at 7500 feet, the mountain summer comes slowly,
and the leaves have just erupted on the Aspen on the back patio. This is more than three weeks later than in Albuquerque. The Mountain Mahogany are just showing tiny leaves unfolding, and the scrub oak will not leaf out until June.


These last few days we have experienced another cold snap, although without precipitation. This morning when we commenced our walk at dawn, the air temp was 24 degrees. Now, at mid-morning it is 49.

But I still like the idea that summer is upon us!

When Hannukah Comes (Early) Right on Time

The other day, as I was struggling with my paper, I said to my husband, Bruce, "Am I dreaming or does Hannukah come early this year?"

As he began to answer, N. piped up with: "Hannukah comes right on time every single year."

And of course he's right. It comes exactly when it is supposed to come according to the Jewish calendar.

Hannukah starts at sunset Tuesday (tomorrow!) night, because that is the beginning of the 4th day of the week, and the 25th day of the month of Kislev.

That the 25th day of Kislev happens to be 11 days earlier on the solar calendar this year than last is not a problem for the Jewish calendar. It is a problem for those of us who live both the Jewish and the secular calendars.

The Jewish calendar has evolved to be a lunisolar calendar--or a lunar calendar that is intercalated with the solar year. This has to do with the origins of the Jewish people. As we say every year at Passover time, "My father (Abraham) was a wandering Aramean..." As a desert people, a lunar calendar made sense. You can see the moon wax and wane, and the length of time of a quarter is about 7 days. (It's actually a bit more, but it works well enough). Thus the seven day week, as well as the concept of Shabbat--one day in seven to rest--is brought to you by the Jewish people.

But as our history changed, we began to need to count our days according to the solar year, the cycle of the earth around the sun. This is because our wandering shepherd people left the desert and the three black ones--shade, dates, and water--behind, coming into the land of Cana'an, met and married with settled people who lived in towns and farmed the land. A farmer has to know when to plant and when to harvest, and the lunar calendar cycles completely around the solar year over time, as the Islamic calendar still does today, over a period of about 33 years.

There are twelve months in the Jewish year, and each one is either 29 or 30 days long, depending on the actual time of the new moon. The current names for the months were borrowed from the Babylonians during the time of the Babylonian exile, and reflect the Babylonian Zodiac, which has also become the Hebew Zodiac. The picture to the right is of a mosaic on the floor of the 6th Century (CE) synagogue at Bet Alfa, Israel.

But there is a problem. The Shaloshim Regalim--the pilgrimage festivals, are all agricultural as well as religious, and the dates must fall during a certain phase of the moon as related to the solar year. For example, Passover falls on the first full moon following (but not on) the vernal equinox.

Prior to the Babylonian exile, the Hebrew year began with Aviv, the month of spring, and this is still the new year for counting months. And the word Aviv, now translated as "spring," originally meant "beginning the barley harvest." So the priesthood simply added a month whenever it was clear that the full moon that would be Pesach would be too early for beginning to harvest, and the roads would be too muddy for the pilgrimage to Jerusalem.

After the Roman wars and the beginning of exile, this became unwieldy. So instead, a series of calculations were done by the Patriarch (Nasi) and the Sanhedrin, in order to set the Jewish year so that it would be uniform throughout the world. There was great complexity in these calculations, since the Hebrew year must intercalate with the solar year, and certain Holy Days must not fall on Friday or Sunday, and certain festivals must match the seasons. The rules of the calendar came into place throughout the Talmidic era, and all of the evidence shows that before the time of the 10th century CE (921) Saadia Gaon (Genius of the Talmudic Academy of Sura) they were all in place.

The rules of the calendar were codified by the Rambam (Rabbi Moshe ben Maimon), aka Maimonides in Greek (Just to make things more interesting, he had an Arabic name, too, since he was born in Cordova, Spain, during the age of Islamic rule) in 1178 CE. About the problem of the intercalary he wrote:

"By how much does the solar year exceed the lunar year? By approximately 11 days. Therefore, whenever this excess accumulates to about 30 days, or a little more or less, one month is added and the particular year is made to consist of 13 months, and this is the so-called embolismic (intercalated) year. For the year could not consist of twelve months plus so-and-so many days, since it is said: throughout the months of the year (Num. 28:14), which implies that we should count the year by months and not by days." (The Sanctification of the New Moon).

The picture is of a manuscript by the Rambam, written in Judeo-Arabic with Hebrew letters.

So now, the Jewish month begins approximately one day after the newborn moon, when the crescent can just be seen in the sky. This is because, although we calculate the months astronomically, in the old days it was declared by the Kohen Gadol (High Priest), and later by the Nasi of the Sanhedrin. And seven times during a cycle of 19 years, we add an extra month just before the month of Nisan (the Babylonian equivalent of Aviv), making a Jewish "leap month."

This year, 5768 is a leap year in the Jewish calendar, so next year the Holy Days will be "later."

And this is why Bruce, N. and I had a conversation about Hannukah, which feels early this year.

But of course, it starts right on time, at sunset tomorrow night, the beginning of the day of the 25th of Kislev, 5768. And it continues through Rosh Chodesh Tevet (the new moon that starts the month of Tevet) and continues until the 3rd day of Tevet, 5768, which is Wednesday, December 12, 2007 in the Western solar calendar.

And the conversation?

I said: "Am I dreaming or is Hannukah coming early this year?"

Bruce: "You're right."

N: "Hannukah comes right on time every single year!"

Bruce: You're right!"

N: "But you said she's right...and I'm right..."

Bruce: "You're both right!"

And, because we live on two calendars, so we are!

The Vernal Equinox and "the Month of Spring"

Happy first day of spring according to the new calendar.

To the right is the sunrise this morning. The came up quite a bit to the north of where it came up on the Groundhog's day cross-quarter day. At that time, the sun came up in the notch in the trees above the house across the street.

It is now coming up due east, which is right for the equinox.

Yesterday was Rosh Chodesh Nisan--the new moon of Nisan, which is the first day of the month of Nisan. It is also called Chodesh Aviv--the month of spring. This is a very important month for us because on the night of the full moon of spring we celebrate the Pesach Seder--the feast of Passover--and for the next seven days we celebrate the festival of unlevened bread--Z'man Cheruteynu--the season of our freedom. Yesterday we read:

"Adonai said to Moshe and Aharon in the land of Mitzrayim (Egypt, literally, "the narrow places"): This month shall mark for you the beginning of the months; it shall be the first of the months of the year for you..."

Yesterday then, was also Rosh Hashanah Chodeshim--the New Year for Months. which is one of the four new years celebrated in the Jewish calendar. We will not taste Matzah for any snacks until the evening of the 14th--the full moon--when we celebrate Pesach.

I am still busy with the preparations for Pesach. I need to finish shopping for Passover food and kasher (make fit) the kitchen for Passover. This involves all sorts of unusual cleaning practices, including changing the dishes, immersing every day implements in boiling water, and using a blow-torch to clean the stove burners! I am grateful that I now also have a self-cleaning oven, which makes kashering the oven more practical. (Now is payback time for our Christian friends, who will smile at this piece of insanity just as we smiled at the practice of bringing a large, dying tree into the house and the vacuuming of pine needles in December).

The weather is absolutely beautiful. They keep threatening clouds and possible rain--which would be alright--but so the far the barometer has stayed stubbornly high. If it does rain, then according to old weather lore, we are in luck because on the quarter days the weather of the day predicts the weather for the season. We have been told to expect a dry spring because El Nino shut down rather suddenly a few weeks ago.

N. says: "Whatever! I just hope that La Nina stays far away from the Pacific. We need a good monsoon this summer."

Happy Spring!