I can't hate June

Three times this week I’ve had three different people say to me “I hate June.” They have all been referring to the unfortunate and untimely losses of loved ones during this month, Mom being the first on that list.

But June… I love June. I think it is BECAUSE I love June that I am able to wade through the related emotions that are so prevalent this time of year. If the deaths happened during a bleak, dark month like January or February one would have to scrape me up off the floor and glue all the pieces together so that I could keep going on with life. But June… June is a gift, a song, a wonder. I was so traumatized by the dark, frigid winter that greeted me in Germany when I arrived on my mission that I may never recover. But June… June is what we are promised if we wade through the knee-deep months of winter. June is what March and April hint at with their whisper warm days. June is what July and August used to be before the life is baked out of them. And June in Utah Valley… the foothills are green and velvet-lush, Timp is still snow-capped, the skies are bluer than air should be, and the clouds make hide-and-seek shadows on the hills. You can still escape to the mountains and feel cold, you can be outside without discomfort, evenings are still cool enough that summer seems temporary. By the time August hits, the hills are brown and dry, the air is unforgiving, the earth is baked. I remember the years spent at the Shell and the smell of SCERA Park on June mornings- it still seemed like a blessing that the world was school-free, theater-y, and full of puffy white clouds. June at Sundance is more magical still- nights are cold, dew is heavy, the mountains are young with life. Summer projects were new, school still freshly left behind and the freedom from it was liberating.

So June… without June being what it is, I, too, would hate June. But I know that my mom would have refused to leave this earth without a breath of June inside her. I know that she, too, lived for the first sunsets of summer, and I can’t help but think about the last thing she looked at through earthly eyes- facing West at sunset in June… nothing less would do.