Summer is in the heat of it right now. It doesn’t officially end for about seven more weeks. But I always think of August as the last month of Summer.
The autumnal equinox this year occurs on Tuesday, September 22, 2026, at approximately 8:05 PM Eastern Daylight Time. Just in case you wondered. That is the official astronomical beginning of fall in Ohio and throughout the Northern Hemisphere.
But back to August. It is just getting underway.
Most of us know that August is named after the Roman emperor Augustus. It was originally called Sextilis because it was the sixth month in the old Roman calendar. I, for one, am glad that it is no longer called Sextilis. If that were the case, I bet there would be a population upswing nine months from now in late April and early May.
The logistics of August are steeped in ego. As you know, August has 31 days. According to tradition, an extra day was added so that Augustus’s month would be as long as July, which was named after Julius Caesar. Those big heads wore big figgy leaf crowns.
It is typically the hottest month, too. For those people in the Northern Hemisphere. Apparently, this has to do with the oceans that are giving off heat due to the warming of the summer.
Here is another thing. You can give it a rest in August, as it is one of only two months in which no major federal holiday is observed in the United States. The other is March.
If you were born in this month, like Franklin D. Roosevelt (August 30, 1882), you probably know the birthstones. They are peridot, spinel, and sardonyx. They are green, red, and stripey brown and white, respectively.
The birth flowers are the gladiolus and the poppy. I don’t really know these, but I am pretty sure the poppies were in The Wizard of Oz.
And finally, Alaska became the 49th U.S. state on August 21, 1959.
I don’t know what the dessert of the month might be, but if I were choosing, it would be Baked Alaska.
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“Delight in the beauty of the season.” — Lailah Gifty Akita
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“One must maintain a little bit of summer, even in the middle of winter.” — Henry David Thoreau
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“Time has a wonderful way of showing us what really matters.” — Margaret Peters
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“Every day is a new beginning. Take a deep breath, smile, and start again.” — S. Dixon
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