JULY – the sun's deep breath

JULY (the 7^th month of the year in the Gregorian calendar) is the crown jewel of summer in the Northern Hemisphere…a season unapologetically alive, unfolding in sun-drunk hours and breeze-heavy nights. All sorts of flowers continue to blossom in such a wild manner…nothing asks for permission…everything simply blooms!

Metaphorically speaking, this month doesn’t arrive with the shy promise of spring or the brilliance of autumn’s pageant, but with a confidence that is warm, steady, and unrelenting. There’s a kind of stillness that only July understands.

"July walks in barefoot, humming something wild /
with sun-dappled shoulders and pockets full of time."

Where June teeters at the edge of summer’s threshold, July dives in fully. It begins already mid-celebration, with lots of outdoors festivals, with fireworks that split the sky and laughter that spills onto porches and piers. It is a month that invites us to slow down and stretch out, to savor more and strive less. July is a pause with a pulse.

"July is a blaze / in the middle of the year, / an exhale of light."

In July there is a rhythm of radiance; days are long…dazzlingly…defiantly…long. Evenings linger like reluctant guests at a golden-hour banquet, while the sun becomes less of an object in the sky and more of a presence, like a daily ceremony of light and heat.

Children dart through sprinklers, chasing invisible prizes, while gardeners bend low under the weight of tomato vines...melons swell in the soil, the air smells of basil and barbeque…without any doubt, there's something cute in the sweat that beads on a sunburnt shoulder.

"Sunlight pools in the hollows of trees / and every shadow speaks of warmth."

On the other hand, we could measure July in ice cream drips and pages turned poolside, in the hush of a fan through an open window, in the fireworks that echo long after they fade…there’s a generosity to it and we can easily see how July gives without holding (it holds nothing in reserve).

Some say July is a dream, but dreams fade, while July lingers it is etched into memory with crystalline clarity. Maybe it's the heat that brands it there, maybe the summer typical “rituals”, such as camping trips, weddings, reunions, festivals, or even the quiet days, when nothing “big” happens, could become a milestone.

July is that perfection made tactile, the perfect blend of memory and midsummer….and yes, its midsummer’s peak, and we’re invited to live like poets…even if just for a season….to notice more, to feel deeper, to chase what matters and let go of what doesn’t.

In a world addicted to the urgent, July whispers: rest. This is the best time to take the long way home, to sit longer at the dinner table, to look up, to let time ripple outward like the lake after you dive in.

There is a humility in July’s heat, which somehow it reminds us that we are small but alive, tied though to something bigger…the sky, the sea, the sun, and….time.  In the heart of summer, even silence is golden...you, a hammock, a book, or perhaps nothing at all…just you and the great golden hush.

"Even solitude feels lighter / when the sky is this wide."

In the end, July teaches us to live without flinching; to love the heat, the haze, the honesty; to stretch toward the joy as the sunflower stretches toward the sky…deliberately, unapologetically, and in full bloom.

July is also a reminder that nothing, not even summer, lasts forever, and that is exactly why it matters.

A big salute to the warmth, to the wonder and to the amazing “generosity” of July!