Somehow today we find ourselves halfway through the year. It is July now, and so here is your Convivio Book of Days Calendar for July. It’s a printable PDF on standard US Letter size paper, and it is a good companion to the blog. This month’s cover stars are strips of handmade paper tied in the bamboo in our back yard and left to flutter in the wind and weather. Upon each strip of paper is a wish. It’s a lovely custom surrounding Tanabata, the star festival of Japan that falls each year on the Seventh day of the Seventh month.
This month brings as well the conclusion of Ramadan with Eid Ul-Fitr. There are a few national holidays: Today, the First, is Canada Day, and of course our own Independence Day on the Fourth, and on the Fourteenth, Bastille Day in France. July ushers in the Dog Days of summer, traditionally the hottest part of the year, ruled by the dog star Sirius, and it brings a number of saints’ days––St. Anne and St. James, St. Martha and St. Swithins. And come the end of the month, it is Lammas Eve: It is the day Shakespeare chose as the birthday of Juliet. The eve ushers in August and Lammas, which is our first marker of summer’s passing into fall.
But that’s a long time from now. Now we welcome July.
