we are made of star-stuff

Today is the summer solstice.

For many of us living in a nonagrarian culture, our days aren't dictated by nature, but they're still backgrounded by it — the sun peeks into the window earlier and earlier in the morning. The sun, the star of our planet, is easy to take for granted, given our reliance on electricity, street lighting and temperature control.

With each day growing shorter from today until winter, we're reminded of the ever changing, cyclical nature of the living world.

When I was in college, I took several classes in astronomy. The moment I heard that going to the observatory was a "requirement," I was hooked. I thought of becoming an astronomer until I found out that astronomers these days don't go to observatories anymore but sit in front of computers observing radio waves. But being with the stars opened me up in a way my ungrounded, searching 18-year-old self needed.

As the astronomer Carl Sagan said: The cosmos is within us. We are made of star-stuff. We are a way for the universe to know itself.

The elements that make up our bodies were created by stars billions of years ago. We are nature, too — not simply in the makeup of our bodies, but in the cycles those elements set in motion in our lives.

This is easy to forget, given how much we rely on alarm clocks and our phones to tell us what's happening and what comes next. The world can feel like it's spinning out of control with overdemanding schedules and news cycles that seem to move faster than the rhythms of nature. We end up out of sync — and in these conditions, it's easy to lose sight of what's important.

When we celebrate the summer solstice, we are remembering our connection to nature, to ourselves as nature, and the temporariness of it all.