The year just tipped. Did you feel it? With the solstice, the sun has now achieved its greatest zenith for the year, and from this moment forward to the winter solstice, we are in a season of the sun in flux. It’s a beautiful and timeless dance, and one that has not changed for all of human history. The sun still rises in the same place on the solstice, shining its beams through the lintels of Stonehenge and the rocks of Machu Pichu, regardless of the millennia that have passed since those monuments were laid in place by our ancestors.

Harmony and beauty outside of time, as we spin through the vacuum of space on our little blue sphere of heaven.

In my own world, that observance came quietly, as I sat on my front stoop in the late sunlight. The pink sky and warm air draped over my shoulders, my eyes taking in the beams of light that are my children as they frolicked on my emerald green lawn. The blades of grass were freshly mowed into catywhompus stripes by a nine-year old boy giddy at finally being given the responsibility of a power tool. He was followed closely by his copper-haired and equally shaggy seven-year old brother, slurping on a purple popsicle and kicking the fallen piles of grass with glee. Their sister sprawled on her belly next to me on the warm concrete walk, inspecting ants and dripping popsicle puddles for the ants to feast upon- their own Solstice treat.

For a few brief moments, all was well in the world, and like the planet in her place in heavens, I felt perfect balance. This is as close to heaven as we ever get here. And it was beautiful.