Happy Spring! (And Happy Fall to Eva and the gang in Australia). At 10:32 a.m. in Los Angeles today, March 20th, the sun passes directly over the equator, marking the point of equal (equi) night (nox).
Given that good parenting, as well as happiness for us parents (and readers, by this point I hope, trust that one need not have children to be a “parent,” only to care about each other and the world), benefits from balance, today is an excellent day to think about where we’ve been, where we’re going and, most importantly, where we are right now.
Back in June on the summer solstice I committed to a year of blogging mindfully, and this is a fine day to consult that post to return to your own original intention, or set one now. Those who have read around the calendar with me have crossed the fall equinox (when Persephone departs for the underworld) and in December we crossed the winter solstice and the bright tidings hidden within the darkest day.
Today signals the ¾ mark on the journey around the calendar as well as the earth’s journey around the sun, a day that has long been of great importance to human beings. Some of the coincident myths that follow the sun include both the Jewish Passover (the first full moon after the equinox) and Easter (after all, the Last Supper was a Jewish Seder, or Passover meal). Ancient Persians represented this day as the earth,a bull, fighting eternally with the sun, a lion. The Egyptians built the great Sphinx to face the sun on 
the vernal equinox and the Mayans set it up so a great snake is illuminated crawling down the pyramid of Chichen Itza on this same day—a day Indiana Jones would just have to love.
So, without further pretense on such a day of portents, I invite us all to look at the passing of the shadows on our porches and sills, at our back doors and across our children’s faces, playing over the fur of our pets and dappling the light through quickening leaves, radiance falling with equanimity on the garbage and the flowers. Perhaps this post reaches you as the night envelopes, in equal measure to the day, a good time to note the Shadow within and around, seeking balance with the light within and with the sun hurrying to 
meet us all again in fair time.
Let’s dedicate this most auspicious day of balance to finding balance within ourselves, between ourselves and our children and between ourselves and our fellows—human, animal, vegetable and mineral… as well as unseen and/or ephemeral—all in the liberating and, hopefully fun, service of our little round corner of the cosmos and all its collective children.
Namaste, Bruce
