News from Jules | 07.01.2024 | The Longest Day

I was aligned and eager for the longest day of the year.

For several years now, I start the new year on the Spring Equinox in March as one of many small ways to live in harmony with nature. Moving through the four seasons feels more natural than following a calendar where an arbitrary date marks an abrupt beginning and end.

As if there was an on/off switch to our days, years, seasons—yesterday/today, 2023/2024, spring/summer—instead of a gradual transition. Moving forward and back. At the same time.

As of Summer Solstice on June 20, we are moving from late spring into early summer, but it sure doesn’t feel like it here—it feels like we’ve already done summer, not just spring.

During March and April, the weather in Central Oregon gradually became more consistent and the flowers slowly started to bloom just as the trees outside my second-story northeast-facing bedroom window transitioned from bare branches to bursting with green leaves.

But, as the days grew longer and my leg grew stronger, everything started to speed up.

There were so many more social invitations than usual for coffee, brunch, potlucks, concerts and birthdays—with new local friends in Bend and old Portland friends passing through town. And so many impromptu opportunities to be outside hiking, biking, climbing, camping, backpacking, standup paddleboarding (SUP), hanging out at a brewery patio or just sunbathing in the park.

Squeezed in before work and after work, even between shifts and on Sabbath, because each one was a Heck Yes!

I was excited and inspired, but quickly felt tired and grumpy. Initially, I heard myself complaining about my packed schedule of invitations and opportunities, but after each and every Yes! I felt so grateful for the experience. Oh right, this was living life to the fullest!

I reminded myself:

• Yes, the days will eventually grow shorter but right now there are 16 hours of light!

• That’s plenty of time to figure things out, make plans, and secure reservations. And there’s also plenty of time to play and explore and rest and do nothing.

• Yes, we’ll be tired all summer.

• And yes, it will be totally worth it.

I remembered: Spring is practice. It’s about building back the stamina for abundance. Being able to receive it—and appreciate it. Spring is the time to gather the kindling and the logs, build the fire pit, and start to set the logs aflame for the bonfire that is summer.

According to Joyce Rupp and Macrina Wiederkehr, authors of The Circle of Life: The Heart’s Journey through the Seasons, the festival of Beltane is an ancient Celtic celebration of early summer when huge bonfires were lit on the highest hills. It was a celebration of the embers of life coming into full flame again in the season of summer.

“There’s a fire within you that can’t be ignored…this season has a passion, energy, and drive that pushes you to the next creation or conversation,” wrote Maia Toll in Wild Wisdom Companion: A Guided Journey into the Mystical Rhythms of the Natural World, Season by Season.

“There’s a desire to use every drop of sunlight. Something deep within your DNA knows that this moment of high energy is quickly passing and you should use it while it lasts.”

And so it was in early June when I noticed the opportunity in my schedule to reunite with friends from my spiritual women’s group in Portland and spend solstice at the Oregon Coast. It was a stretch, but doable to drive over after work, be there for the day, and then drive back the following afternoon before my 8:30 am shift that Saturday.

I had plenty of time for reflection during the five-hour drive over the mountains to Nehalem Bay State Park, a campground nestled in the dunes of Manzanita Beach—the same beach where I had last seen them while on retreat at the end of February, a special place for all of us and a spiritual home to me since 2007.

A whole season had passed since I planted my seed of intention for this next cycle of growth—learning to fearlessly and faithfully believe. So much has happened since then. So much more is yet to come.

During our retreat in February and into the equinox in late March, I didn’t know where and if I’d find an affordable place to live and stay in Bend or how to make a sustainable living to support being an artist. Especially after breaking my leg in early March. What I did sense was needing to listen to my body, follow my gut, trust my intuition, and stay true to myself in order to strengthen my faith.

My hunch is my passions will lead me there. And so I continue to lean into what “is” instead of what I “wish”—even though they’re wistfully nestled inside one another. What is easily showing up in my life, like daily meditation and my Deschutes River Trail (DRT) section hiking project this summer, and what I want but isn’t getting much traction yet, like purging stuff from storage and mountaineering.

In other words, let it be easy.

During the drive, I gave myself a pep talk about how my favorite hike up Neahkanie Mountain wasn’t easily doable this trip, but I could enjoy a long walk on the beach; how I brought ideas and supplies for a solstice ceremony but wasn’t attached to it happening a certain way or time; how I liked the idea of witnessing the entire day from sunrise to sunset but would defer to my internal clock as my guide.

By the time I arrived, I was aligned and eager for the longest day of the year.

See beautiful photos from solstice on Instagram.

I was awakened by the bird’s conversation around 4:45 a.m., so I arose from my tent and made breakfast before I walked to the beach for a foggy sunrise. I sat for a couple of hours and meditated while watching the slowly creeping waves as the world grew brighter. After a long nap in my tent, I arose again to make tea and brunch as I greeted the slowly stirring neighboring campsites.

I took a long walk on the still foggy beach by myself before returning to the campground to prepare for a ceremony with my friends. We gathered at one of the yurts, made cups of tea, set a simple altar, and coincidentally put our feet together in a circle right at 1:50 p.m. as the Solstice happened in our timezone. We called in the four directions, smudged ourselves, sipped, and discussed this season of life—how our passions are and aren’t playing out in our lives.

Afterward, other friends, partners, kids, and dogs joined us for a feast of vegan happy hour snacks while we sat around one of the other yurt firepits and chatted before folks peeled off for some quiet time. I felt the urge for ice cream, so one of my friends and I took her dog into town to poke around just the two of us. After we returned overly full from two scoops of creamy comfort and warmed by the sun who’d had a similarly late start, I retired to read in my hammock in the Sherwood Forest-like grove of short, twisty trees between the yurts and the beach. I had a tea in one hand, and later, a beer in the other, kindly dropped off by one of my friends passing by.

After a late dinner, we all slowly made our way to the beach for sunset around 9:30 p.m. Both the bright sun to the west and the nearly full moon to the northeast were visible as folks started building the bonfire, and the lilac sky turned into a cobalt blue behind the growing orange flames.

More than 20 friends, parents, children, and dogs, chatted and made s’mores around the fire before eventually heading back way past everyone’s bedtime because it was so hard to peel away from the warmth of the fire and community. I waited for my usual early yawns to kick in and instead found myself deep in conversation with a couple I’d just met until we were the last ones on the beach. We doused the fire with water from the ocean around 1 a.m. before we walked back to the campground under the twinkle of starlight.

Even though it was the first day, I’m pretty sure that it will be one of my favorite days of summer this year.

May you follow your passion, energy and drive wherever it leads you this week.

Love,

Jules

📸 credit: Kat Bucciantini