I always preach to you Chalkheads how important it is to know where you stand...
... compared to where the sun and moon are.
To know the length of your shadow and where it falls throughout the year. The angle of the sun and moon gives us a familiar bearing.
It grounds us.
It comforts us.
I know how the sunlight hits the skyline, where it rises over the lake. I know where it lands on the Northside in July, and how it shifts to the South Shore in winter.
I worked in the Chicago Board of Trade building for decades. Show me a picture of that building in daylight and I can tell you what season it was and what time of day.
That is familiarity.
That is why I live on a grid with a skyline mountain range. That is why I tell you every morning when the sun rises and when it sets.
Pull the Morning Chalkboard from any July 31st, and you will see that the times hardly change.
There is comfort in that kind of constancy...
... like crawling into your parents' bed long after it is gone.
I just want to have the comfort of knowing where my shadow falls. Because we are not always with those that we care about...
... But we can look up and see the same sun or moon and feel their presence next to us.
Bring it in closer: the birds. They mark beginnings, endings, lost loved ones, with each chirp is a gentle minuet.
And the wind?
In the spring, it whooshes through the trees with newness. In the summer, it skates across leaves like a wet bed sheet hanging on the clothesline. By late summer, it crunches through the forest with fatigue. Come winter, it gallops through bare branches with the kiss of cold discontent.
We are closing out July.
August steps in.
The days shorten.
The shadows grow long.
Find where the sun and moon fall on your path and where they are on your journey. It will add the comfort that you might need on this fetched day of gravity.
Today the sun has a smile, the sky holds a pleasant breeze, and everything is lined up just right for finding astonishment and enjoying a little gusto.
