Book of Days

It is a time of balance today as all parts of the planet receive equal measure of day and night: it is the vernal equinox in the Northern Hemisphere, the autumnal equinox in the Southern, with a 5:37 AM arrival time here in Lake Worth, which is currently in Eastern Daylight Time. Tomorrow––since change is the only thing that stays the same––things shift yet again, and day will be just a bit longer than night here in the North, while night will be just a bit longer than day in the South. And on it goes, until the next moment of extreme in June, when the Midsummer solstice brings the Northern Hemisphere’s longest day, and the Southern Hemisphere’s longest night.

With the spring equinox comes Nowruz, the Persian new year, celebrated by people in Iran and many other places throughout the Middle East, Central Asia, and the Balkans. Nowruz preparations revolve around a thorough cleaning of the home: a spring cleaning, you might say. Families calculate the equinox moment and then begin their celebrations, which involve an abundance of good food and go on for several days.

Other springtide holidays are fast approaching: Passover will begin in the Jewish calendar on the 27th at sunset, and in the Hindu calendar, Holi, the Festival of Colors, comes the next day. That same day in the Christian calendar brings Palm Sunday, setting off the events of Holy Week on the approach to Easter. But not before we celebrate Lady Day, or the Feast of the Annunciation, on the 25th… and that is a day for eating waffles, thanks to a bit of linguistic confusion in Sweden. Every one of these celebrations is tied, in one way or another, to the start of spring and this balance of day and night. This old earth, meanwhile, just does what it does: it spins around each day and spends a year circling around the sun on its tilted axis, giving us our seasons and all the love and celebration we place in them.

Image: March Equinox 2021, a projected Earth daylight distribution on the March Equinox (Northern Spring; Southern Autumn) as seen on SpaceEngine [Creative Commons, via Wikimedia Commons].