June Gloom
Tomorrow marks the first day of summer. The
summer solstice. Midsummer's Day. Longest day of
the year. I live a mile from the beach in San
Diego, America's Finest City, a prime destination
for visitors seeking sun and surf during the
summer. So you'd think that I'd be loving life
right now, soaking up the rays like a true
sun-worshipping beach bum. I don't think so. "Sun
Diego" is known for its beautiful beaches, its
near-perfect climate, its wealth of outdoor
activities. Unfortunately, another hallmark of this
fine city is "June Gloom."
Though June welcomes the beginning of summer, it
also sees less sunshine than any other month of the
year in San Diego. As the air over land warms up,
it meets the cool air chilled by the cold Pacific
Ocean. The colder air gets trapped beneath the
warmer air, and the coastal fog and clouds—the
"marine layer"—have nowhere to go. As a
result, June in San Diego means gray, overcast,
"gloomy" days.
This year's June Gloom has been gloomier than
ever. In fact, it got an early start, generating a
soundalike nickname for last month: "May Gray." For
the last six weeks or more, the sun has peeked out
on only a handful of occasions. Day after day,
gunmetal gray clouds have weighed down in darkly
oppressive skies. I'm starting to think I live in
Seattle.
It's thicker than usual too. In normal June
Glooms, you can escape the oppression by simply
driving a few miles inland. The marine layer
normally keeps to the coast, leaving the rest of
the county to bask in warm sunshine. But this year,
the gloom has covered the entire county in a thick
gray blanket. On my trip to the local mountains two
weeks ago, I didn't escape it till I had reached
nearly 3,000 feet of elevation and had left the
last little town—Pine Valley—in my
wake.
I'm sure my readers in other parts of the
country are shaking their heads in contempt.
Admittedly, we southern Californians are quite
spoiled when it comes to the weather. But that's
just the point. When you're used to having perfect,
sunny days 11 months out of the year, a month of
overcast days is "gloomy" indeed.
©2003 Michael
Strickland ALL RIGHTS
RESERVED
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