The dog days of summer, that hot stretch between early July and mid-August, traces its origins to the night sky. The expression is a reference to Sirius, the brightest visible star from our planet, also known as the Dog Star. During these dog days, the Sun lives in the same part of the sky as Sirius, both rising and setting together. And because the star is so bright, the ancient Romans believed it actually added to the Sun’s heat, which accounted for the stretch of hot and sultry weather.
It's the fourth week in July. Today, continuing our theme of dog days, Susan Bruns reads an excerpt from Joe Wilkins memoir, “The Mountain and The Fathers: Growing Up in the Big Dry.” Wilkins is the author of the novel "Fall Back Down When I Die" and three collections of poetry, including "When We Were Birds," which won the 2017 Oregon Book Award in Poetry.
Our guest this month is Susan Bruns. Bruns’ work has appeared in Lithub, Brevity, Creative Nonfiction, among many other places. She is currently at work on a memoir about growing up on a small family farm in Idaho.
Something I Heard is supported by Idaho Commission on the Arts and the National Endowment for the Arts.
