{"id":11999,"date":"2020-09-20T23:11:08","date_gmt":"2020-09-21T03:11:08","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/orionscoldfire.com\/?p=11999"},"modified":"2020-09-20T23:11:08","modified_gmt":"2020-09-21T03:11:08","slug":"more-wolfs-bane","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/orionscoldfire.com\/index.php\/2020\/09\/20\/more-wolfs-bane\/","title":{"rendered":"More Wolf\u2019s Bane?"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"\"
Wolfs Bane Coming Into Bloom<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

This has been a goofy mixed up year for weather.\u00a0 The spring and early summer were extremely cool and delayed many plants by almost a month from their normal cycle of growth.\u00a0 For the most part this wasn\u2019t too bad but one plant that blooms late in the summer is wolf\u2019s bane.\u00a0 And as of today, the very last gasp of summer, the leaves on the plants are turning yellow and the flowers aren\u2019t even buds yet, they\u2019re bumps.\u00a0 What we have here is a foot race between flowers and frost. \u00a0Last night it got down to 36\u00b0F.\u00a0 That is dangerously flirting with freezing.\u00a0 There are two more nights of near freezing temperatures coming up before a warm up is predicted.\u00a0 I don\u2019t like my chances here.\u00a0 I need a miracle.<\/p>\n

Maybe you\u2019re saying to yourself, \u201cWhat\u2019s the big deal if some stupid plant doesn\u2019t flower?\u201d\u00a0 Well, that\u2019s a fair question.\u00a0 I\u2019ll try to explain.<\/p>\n

The Calendar tracks the path of Earth as it performs its seemingly eternal dance with the Sun.\u00a0 And here at the Autumnal Equinox we mark the point where the northern latitudes lose their grip on the sun and slip into darkness.\u00a0 For millennia the inhabitants of the North have recognized this moment and celebrated it with various harvest festivals and religious myths like the Death of Tammuz or the Rape of Persephone. \u00a0These solemn occasions were meant to memorialize the end of summer and the beginning of the harvest.<\/p>\n

Nowadays most of us aren\u2019t involved in farming and the advent of electric lights has lessened the impact of shorter days on our lives.\u00a0 But for some of us the end of summer is still an extremely meaningful time.\u00a0 As I have so often stated here on the site I am an avowed therophile (lover of summer) and the autumnal equinox is like a death knell for me.\u00a0 Like some primitive soul I atavistically search for a formula or spell to help me fight off the fear of darkness and believe that summer will reemerge on the other side of the sun all those months in the future.\u00a0 And for me the first step is to take the last gasp of summer, the blooming of the wolf\u2019s bane flowers and tie that to the next great festival on my calendar, Halloween.<\/p>\n

For Halloween begins \u00a0for me with watching the classic Universal horror movies.\u00a0 And I always start with Dracula.\u00a0 Here we see Dracula square off against Dr. Van Helsing for possession of the soul of Mina Seward.\u00a0 And in this battle one of the prime weapons is a garland of wolf\u2019s bane.\u00a0 Vampires hate it and all good vampire fighters carry it with them.\u00a0 And later on in the Universal series we will come to the Wolfman.\u00a0 Here we are told:<\/p>\n

Even a man who\u2019s pure at heart<\/p>\n

And says his prayers by night<\/p>\n

May become a wolf when the wolf\u2019s bane blooms<\/p>\n

And the autumn moon is bright<\/p>\n

And that is the link between summer and wolf\u2019s bane and autumn and Halloween.\u00a0 And Halloween gets you to Thanksgiving.\u00a0 And Thanksgiving gets you to Christmas.\u00a0 And Christmas has to get you to Easter and the beginning of spring.\u00a0 But it all starts with wolf\u2019s bane.\u00a0 So wish me luck.\u00a0 If nature lets me down I\u2019ll have to take drastic action and invoke the only other Summer\/Halloween talisman I know of.\u00a0 I\u2019ll have to have an early showing of \u201cSomething Wicked This Way Comes.\u201d\u00a0 Bradbury\u2019s story provides a direct link between summer and Halloween by way of the carnival theme.\u00a0 Carnivals are summer and end of summer events.\u00a0 But in the story we have a Halloween arrival of a dark carnival that is looking to ensnare souls.\u00a0 The battle between good and evil is to my mind the battle between summer and autumn.\u00a0 Between life and death.\u00a0 Okay, that\u2019s the end of my raving.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

This has been a goofy mixed up year for weather.\u00a0 The spring and early summer were extremely cool and delayed many plants by almost a<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_mi_skip_tracking":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_active":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_note":"","_exactmetrics_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1263],"tags":[1391,253,417,423,1412],"class_list":["post-11999","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-stuff-that-personally-interests-me-miscellaneous","tag-halloween","tag-summer","tag-universal-classic-monster-movies","tag-wolfs-bane","tag-wolfsbane"],"yoast_head":"\nMore Wolf\u2019s Bane? - Orion's Cold Fire<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/orionscoldfire.com\/index.php\/2020\/09\/20\/more-wolfs-bane\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"More Wolf\u2019s Bane? 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