December 21, 2019

White Dog watched me flip the page on my calendar, took a deep breath, and went in search of the White Dog Army. "Today is the Winter Solstice," she happily barked. "The days will start getting longer again!"

"What is this mumbo-jumbo?" Bailey asked skeptically. "Is it something you read that the humans made up, like daylight savings time?"

"No," WD pushed back. "It is science. This is what Wikipedia says: The winter solstice, hiemal solstice or hibernal solstice, also known as midwinter, occurs when one of the Earth's poles has its maximum tilt away from the Sun. It happens twice yearly, once in each hemisphere. For that hemisphere, the winter solstice is the day with the shortest period of daylight and longest night of the year, when the Sun is at its lowest daily maximum elevation in the sky. At the pole, there is continuous darkness or twilight around the winter solstice. Its opposite is the summer solstice. LOTS of nature responds to this day from animals in the wild to plants."

When, in the late afternoon, twilight began, the White Dog Army rushed out to the deck. "Somepup check the clock," I heard Opal yell and Bella rushed back inside to gaze up at the kitchen wall clock. Outside the countdown was on..."almost, almost, almost NOW! Mark the time!"

"Four, fifty eight and 41 seconds," Bella called back.

The WDA thundered back into the office. "Look up when the sunset YESTERDAY," they demanded of Steve. "Four, fifty eight and 12 seconds," he responded. 

"Well that is not shorter, really," Tizenegy argued. "It is the same." "SCIENCE, brother," Zso teased, " it IS 29 seconds different. Almost half a minute." Tiz huffed off to his bed. "Who cares about half a minute?"

White Dog stepped in before tempers flared. "At a half minute a day, we will be back to long leisurely afternoons and sunsets that happen LONG after dinner in just a couple of months. We need to light a Yule log to celebrate. Better yet, Dad could you go to the bakery and buy an edible yule log?"