May Gray Means Short Days

Tweet

When I was a kid living in Southern California, there was a phenomenon we all hated. It was June Gloom. You see, springtime in SoCal meant that the days became longer, the sunshine more intense. That is, until the school year rolled to an end in June. In June, the coastal clouds showed up, even in the inland valleys. The sky was covered and gray, and so was our mood. Gone was the energy and hyper behavior of the teenagers walking around campus. This helped the teachers keep a lid on the end of year excitement, but no one really liked it. A few years ago, as SoCal weather changed, the gray mornings spread from June into May. The weather forecasters needed a catchy phrase to describe this. So they came up with May Gray. It’s pretty firmly established now. We have two months of coastal clouds or fog instead of the one month of my youth. But coastal clouds do not necessarily burn off in the morning. Sometimes, depending upon wind conditions and where you live, your entire day may seem like twilight. This week, my days have been very short. You see, without sunlight, it doesn’t feel like daytime at all. Therefore, although technically days get longer as we move toward summer, here they do not. Tuesday the sun showed up at 3:00 in the afternoon. Yesterday I saw it cast a shadow at 1:00. I was hoping that today would be better, but we are socked in with a dense fog this morning. I sure am glad I took advantage of the few hours of sunshine yesterday to plant these flowers. They’ll like the moisture in the air this morning, and maybe the afternoon sun, if it ever shows up. Do you have bizarre seasonal oddities like SoCal’s May Gray and June Gloom?