Dog Days of Summer

A sultry wind blows across the yard. It’s been hot for most of the month of August. So hot, most of us stay inside as much as possible. My mother says it’s almost like the long stretches of bitter cold we endure in the winter. We are housebound. We haven’t had rain recently, so the ground is hard and dust gathers on the patio chairs and the hood of my truck. Lawns and gardens are browning. Even the Black-Eyed Susans look thin and thirsty. The bee balm and yellow coneflower, done flowering for the year in a prairie near here, have become crispy. A few leaves on the Black Walnut tree nearest to the house have begun to turn yellow and those that have fallen skitter across the driveway, driven by the late summer wind. My friend Jodeen diligently picks the fully ripe tomatoes off of the prodigious vines in her vegetable garden before it is too late.

When I hear the phrase “Dog Days of Summer,” I think of dogs with their tongues hanging out. The saying seems like something that would have originated during the Dust Bowl in the 1930s. A little research reveals that the Romans used the phrase to refer to the time of year when Sirius, the “dog star,” in the constellation Canis Major “large dog” rose with the sun at the equinox. According to my star maps, Sirius does note rise in the early summer evenings, but instead appears more boldly in the winter, forming a triangle with Betelgeuse on Orion’s shoulder and Procyon. They are three of the brightest objects in our night sky. Even though Sirius doesn’t dominate the hottest summer nights here, I like the idea of having a connection to an ancient civilization that used the stars for a guide to the seasons rather than a National Weather Service app.

For the Egyptians, in addition to hot weather, the rising of Sirius was often a prelude to the Nile flooding. Thus, the dog days have an ominous aura about them. The hot wind does suggest to me that anything could happen, that change is in the air. For Minnesotans, that change could be that the other seasonal shoe will drop and along it with the mercury that used to be in our thermometers. Even those of us who love autumn know what quickly follows. We’ll be wearing our down jackets and mukluks before we know it. 08/29/2010