Most likely you are reading this sentence after the moment of the September Equinox occurred–unless you’re one of my early readers. 07:50 UTC or 2:50 AM CDT is/was the exact time for the global event today. Equinoxes are the biannual moments when the center of the visible Sun appears directly above our Equator.
I prefer to use the terms September Equinox and March Equinox rather than Autumnal Equinox and Vernal Equinox because I have friends and readers who live in various places on Earth. Most of them live in the Northern Hemisphere, but many others are in the Southern Hemisphere. So, while Nebraskans celebrate the first day of Autumn, my friend Rodriguez will celebrate the first day of Spring in Argentina.
It’s during the Equinoxes and the Solstices that I like to ponder our place in the Solar System. This soon leads to visualizing where our planet is in the Milky Way Galaxy, and then the greater Universe. This meditation makes me feel insignificant, yet integral with the much 
greater whole. The exact word that describes the feeling is “astonishment”.
Even though we experience an Equinox twice each year, an Equinox seems like a pretty big deal. I think of the average distance we are from the Sun–about 150-million kilometers or 584 million miles. The distance we travel in our elliptical orbit is some 940-million kilometers or 584-million miles. Due to the fact that our planet’s rotational axis is tilted, we get Equinoxes. We’re constantly moving at breathtaking speed, yet it feels like we’re stationery, plus we have Equinoxes and Solstices. This whole business of living on Earth is quite incredible from an astronomical viewpoint.
In that Equinoxes are worldwide events, shouldn’t they be official holidays?
Happy September Equinox.
Ciao
The Blue Jay of Happiness quotes columnist/editor, the late Doug Larson. “Autumn is a season followed immediately by looking forward to Spring.”
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