HONORING NATURE'S RHYTHMS -
The Story Behind the Calendar
The earliest that I recall playing with the notion of developing my own calendar was during discussions with friends at the 1992 Earth Summit in Rio de Janeiro. I was not happy with the present Gregorian calendar, with months honoring Julius Caesar (July) and Augustus (August), two Roman emperors who lived around 2000 years ago.
Instead, I wanted to devise a method of honoring the rhythms and seasons of Nature, at least as I experience them at home near Saskatoon, Saskatchewan, in western Canada.
The Months
My first idea was to rename the twelve months. I wanted the start dates of four of the months to coincide with what I think of as the four cardinal directions of the calendar:
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* Spring Equinox
* Summer Solstice
* Autumn Equinox
* Winter Solstice
My calendar year begins on March 21st, on or around the Spring Equinox. Each season contains three months. The names of these months correspond to the mystical qualities and energies of Nature as our planet Earth makes its annual pilgrimage around the sun.
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I was intrigued to discover that in the northern hemisphere, we have five or six more days of spring and summer than we do in autumn and winter. That's why my calendar has approximately one more day per month during the warmer climes.
To deal with leap year, I decided to add one more day every four years to the month of Mystery, thus keeping in step with the Gregorian calendar, the traditional calendar that is commonly used in the Western world.
Nature's Dates
Each day of the year has been given a unique name that reflects the shifting energies of both Mother Nature and Human Nature. I call this name Nature's Date. The date is made up of the name for that day and its position within its special month. For example, my birthday, October 3rd, is named Unison, the eleventh day of the month of Balance.
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UNISON the eleventh day of Balance |
My final choice in naming the twelve months is based not only on the overall feeling that the respective images engender, but also on the potential for us to identify with each name as a human element - a description of what we feel like to be with the Pool of Possibilities for that period of time. I will describe the meaning of these names each month in my free e-zine.
My calendar, therefore, consists of 366 uniquely named days, each of which has been matched with an equally unique seasonal photograph. These form the basis of the Pool of Possibilities e-Calendar.
