Singing the praises of the summer solstice

Hey there, time traveller!
This article was published 19/06/2021 (1902 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

Get ready to crank up the volume on your car radios and pump your fists in the air, Winnipeg, because there is only one more sleep before the big day.

And before we go any further I should point out that, no, I am not talking about the fact Sunday marks the second Father’s Day we will be celebrating amid this pandemic.

While we are on the topic, however, allow me to suggest the perfect gift to let Dad know how much you enjoy his bad jokes and his ability to use his propane barbecue to turn delicious food items into inedible lumps of carbon.

This year, Dad does not want you to give him another amusing tie or a bottle of cologne with the sort of eye-watering aroma you would get if you stuck a rotten egg in an old gym bag.

No, what Dad really wants is the one thing he values above everything else — the gift of sleep! Seriously, Dad would be overjoyed if you just ignored him and allowed him to bag some serious Zs in bed, on the couch, or in a backyard hammock.

Now we can get back to the real reason we need to start dancing in the streets — tomorrow marks the first day of summer!

I know you are thinking: “Huh? Considering we have been stuck in a mini-heat wave and birds and squirrels have been spontaneously bursting into flames while sitting on power lines, we kind of assumed that summer was already here.”

Well, from a meteorological perspective, you are completely correct. For professional weather prognosticators, summer began about three weeks ago.

From an astronomical perspective, however, the first day of summer arrives in Winnipeg on Sunday, June 20, at precisely 10:32 p.m., which is the moment when the summer solstice rolls into town.

The summer solstice is when the sun reaches its northernmost point — directly over the Tropic of Cancer, an imaginary line in the sky — and the Earth’s North Pole is at its maximum tilt toward the sun, about 23.5 degrees.

Here in the Northern Hemisphere, it marks the longest day of the year in terms of sunlight; whereas in the Southern Hemisphere (poor penguins) it’s the shortest day of the year and known as the winter solstice.

What you really need to know, however, is that the arrival of the summer solstice is traditionally a time for wild celebrations around the world. Every year, for example, thousands of hipsters and druids (an early form of hipster) descend on Stonehenge, England’s legendary circle of standing stones, face northeast and wait for the second when the sun rises above the famed Heel Stone.

The sad news is that, for the second straight year, the gathering at Stonehenge has been cancelled because of COVID-19 restrictions. On the upside, senior Druid King Arthur Pendragon has posted on his Facebook page that he plans to be there. “And as on previous occasions it is not my intention to break the law — but be there I shall on one side of the fence or another,” is what the No. 1 druid vowed.

Q: So what should we non-druids do to celebrate the long-awaited arrival of the first day of summer, Doug?

A: What I like to do is to mark the moment by cranking up the volume on the radio and basking in the sultry sounds of a classic summer song.

For me, when the solstice saunters in, I like to belt out In the Summertime, a major global smash hit recorded in 1970 by the British pop-blues group Mungo Jerry, in which they croon: “Sing along with us, dee dee dee dee dee/Da da da da da, yeah we’re hap-pap-py/Da da da dee da doo dee da dee da dee da da…”

This year, however, I decided to put my creativity to the test and prove that I can write my very own deeply moving summer song. Which is when I remembered that I am completely tone deaf and have zero musical ability.

So what I did instead is Google “How to write a summer song,” which led me to an online “Summer Song Lyrics Generator,” wherein you punch in a handful of verbs, nouns, adjectives, place names, then click a button and — POOF! — it spits out a sizzling summer song by your imaginary band.

Here is a little taste of the song the computer helped me whip up:

“We’re all going to a summer barbecue/ No more cooking for a week or two/ Loud hotdogs and fast werewolves at our summer barbecue/ No more enraging potatoes for me or you/ For a week or two…

“I wish they all could be/ I wish they all could be/ I wish they all could be hotdogs of Winnipeg.”

Is that a great summer song, or what? Never mind — all that matters is that you raise your voice and sing it like you really mean it.

Just don’t sing too loud, because, what with being a dad, I plan to be sound asleep.

doug.speirs@freepress.mb.ca