It’s all about sunlight, of course. Lots and lots of it. In fact, it never gets dark these days. Sunrise today was at 0258, and sunset will be early tomorrow at 0052, for 21 hours and 54 minutes of possible sunlight. And today, being without clouds, that possibility will be realized. I am going to bed before that promise is fulfilled.
Last night Rose and I were out driving after midnight, and, indeed, the sun’s rays could still be seen, and one of the most spectacular almost-full moons we’d ever seen was hovering magnificently above the Alaska Range. Traffic was substantial, and many vehicles were driving without their lights on. At these light levels it makes sense, even if it seems crazy if you look at your watch.
It’s been a weird year, weather-wise. The winter was cold and held us in its clutches much longer than usual. My last day of skiing was 6 May, the latest ever for me. I could have gone longer if I skate skiied, but I’ve stuck with classic. Some of the old-timers laughed about when winter had really lasted long–so much so that it had snowed on the University graduation ceremony, which is held on Mother’s Day. In a show of one-upmanship, this year’s weather went for a new record, and it snowed pretty much all day on 17 May. I had to scrape my windshield at about 2330 that evening (it was still light out) to drive some guests to the hotel and airport. It had snowed all day. Rose said “If snow had a butt, I’d kick it!”
Just one week later, temperatures were above average, having basically skipped spring entirely and effectively gone through a seasonal sublimation straight into summer. We had to do emergency gardening to catch up, putting in raised beds and getting them seeded in jig time. Leaf Day and the first singing Swainson’s Thrush coincided with our first ever Emergency Gardening Day, and by the end of the weekend I found myself wishing I’d had the sense to measure the rate of leaf growth. What had been green buds on Friday evening were leaves fluttering joyously in a light breeze by Sunday evening. It always seems rapid, but this year it was exceptionally fast.
A week later I found myself out cutting firewood on the first day that we hit 80 F. I just about blew a gasket. Fortunately, I recognized the early signs of heat stroke and was able to cool down and slow up. This is not something we usually have to worry about here in the Far North. But it has been a factor this year. While not record-setting, since then we’ve gone through a considerable heat spell of day after day in the mid- to high-80s. That is hot when your home does not have air conditioning and your body is used to 60s and 70s. For us at home, getting up to 72 indoors is too hot when we’re coming out of our winter acclimation. On the bright side, this weather has been great for drying wood, and the fresh stuff we cut has crazed up rapidly on the ends with the excessive dry heat.
Sleeping in such heat is a challenge. Light keeps us awake, so we have to close everything up with dark shades just when opening the windows wide to capture the evening cool would make sense. We’ve learned to air-juggle, with fans blowing to keep us cool in sleeping quarters while opening up the parts of the house not dedicated to dark sleep caves so that those parts of the house can cool down at night. Then in the morning we close it all up tight to hold as much evening cool as possible while the sun beats down during the day. Oh, did I mention that the sun at its peak is at 48.6 degrees elevation? That’s more than 45 degrees above its peak during the other solstice (the Short One). It does not hover there, though. Instead, it rotates all around at weird, dipping angles all day and night long. It rises high in the northeast and, if I were awake to watch, it sets high in the northwest, having rotated the long way around those compass point in the meantime. (This is actually very cool to experience.)
Deck time was really splendid at first, once the snow ended. But then we got a little rain and the mosquitoes went up to medium and chased us off. The Mosquito Magnet has caught record numbers, which is certainly psychologically satisfying. But it has not reduced the total population to levels that would make deck sitting comfortable of an evening, so we’re making other plans that include mosquito netting. We’ve been surprised that we have not yet had horrendous forest fires. Conditions are providing excellent potential. The couple of fires that have gotten started have either been put out or have had their smoke blow elsewhere. But things are really dry, so this can’t last long. Another odd thing: no thunderstorms yet. These were very rare occurrences in our experience here until the past couple of years, but now they seem surprisingly absent. It is quite dry, so we’ve been watering our lawn and gardens almost daily. A new animal for our yard showed up yesterday to enjoy the watering–a wood frog. And an old friend appeared again after a long hiatus. One morning Rose looked up from the kitchen table and calmly said, “Red fox in the yard.” Sure enough, one had emerged from the woods with a red squirrel in its mouth. It’s nice to have such good friends.
Bird life? It’s been slow with such a late spring and then the rapid heat-up and dryness. We did have a strong pigpoll year, and they bred in the yard again, producing what I like to think of as the $69.99 baby redpolls (the price these days of a forty-pound bag of hulled, medium-chip sunflower seeds). Our Hammond’s Flycatcher showed up by 11 May and actually survived the subsequent cold spell (not all early-arriving insectivores did). We also have a pair of American Robins that have become quite tame, coming in close to feed, especially when the sprinkler is going. Then there is the $2,000 Swainson’s Thrush. I stopped writing for a few minutes to dig up the actual price that the borough charges us each year in taxes for the lot beside us, but then the male, being perhaps somehow attuned to the situation, began singing his exquisite, haunting song for the evening, and I realized that he’s paid his rent (worth every penny). And all is well with the world, at 2300 with sunlight still hitting the peaks and a promising summer upon us.