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| Photo taken last year at sunrise on top of Mount Timpanogos |
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Today is the last calendar day of Winter. Tomorrow, March 20, 2014, spring begins as we observe the vernal equinox here in Utah. At 10:57 AM will mark that special moment when the sun crosses the celestial equator going from south to north. The word equinox is derived from two Latin words–aequus (equal) and nox (night). On the equinox, the length of day, and the length of night will be close to 12 hours each. Depending on your location the sunrise and sunset will be around 7:40 AM/PM.
Early Christians observed the Vernal Equinox by greeting the rising sun on the morning of the equinox by going outside, facing east and shouting three times: "Christos Agarthe" (Christos Ah-gair-thay) which means “Christ is risen."
Spring is a time of rebirth, rejuvenation, renewal, resurrection, and regrowth. It is a time to gather, search, learn, receive and share more light. Light is becoming a more important, essential commodity to have in our life.
It is light, primarily from the Sun, that cause living things to ripen. The word ripen means to bring to completeness or perfection, or come to maturity. We often use the term "ripen" with fruit. In general when fruit is ripe, it is sweeter, softer and malleable.
Interesting to note, there are two ways that you can speed up the ripening process.
You can allow the fruit to mature by placing the fruit in direct sunlight out in the open air. This process will make the fruit more sweet.
or
You can place the fruit in a closed bag (like a brown paper sack), control the environment and “suffocate” it with restricted air and little light. In this process, the fruit will be less sweet and eventually becoming rotten.
The fruit ripen by light will be gathered, the second fruit will be usually be destroyed.
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