Yesterday 4:52 PM marked the beginning of the summer solstice, the little best day of the year on the Northern hemisphere. People have celebrated this day since time immemorial across the globe. The word Solstice means “sun standing still” or “grianstad' in Celtic. This morning I awoke at first light. 5:14 AM.
Back in the last century my friend AJ AND I went out to Stonehenge for a neolithic day trip. I hugged the monumental stones and cried as a Celt, even though they were erected by people's unknown many millennium before the Irish wandered northern Europe. Since then the Crown, which claims ownership of the ruins has restricted entry to the ring of stones. Today thousands of pagans greeted the dawn at Stonehenge. New Yorkers for the most part ignored the yearly phenomena, even though Manhattan's East to West streets from 14th to 155th are aligned with sunrise and sunset during the solstice period.
According to Wikipedia the Commissioners' Plan of 1811 arranged the street grid for most of Manhattan which is rotated 29° clockwise from true east-west. Thus, when the azimuth for sunset is 299° (i.e., 29° north of due West), the sunset aligns with the streets on that gird.
Tomorrow morning I greet the sun naked.
Enjoy the cosmos.
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