Seems like today is my Hive birthday! I had another post scheduled to go off this morning, but I woke up to the happy Hive birthday message, so we’ll run an audible and go with this instead!

Four years on Hive/Steemit!

I remember I had first heard about Steemit sometime before, in spring or early summer. It sounded interesting, so I tried to sign up. I forget the reason, but I couldn’t. I think it was something like you either needed a phone number or had to pay in steem. My Japanese number wasn’t being accepted for some reason and I had no idea how to buy steem in order to pay for an account. I intended to keep trying with my phone, but work and kids put it out of my mind and it was soon forgotten.

Then in Sept I heard about it again, came back, and my phone number was accepted this time! So I signed up and made this post: Konnichiha Steemit! - Hello from Japan!

and included this photo

I had no idea what to do for the longest time, but then started posting haiku, which led to meeting @jonknight (who sadly doesn't seem to be active anymore) who invited me to the Writers Block, where I was quickly made poetry editor (I think one of my first conversations there involved @raj808, who is still active and doing great things around here). The Writers Block split apart a few times. I kept good relations with both sides during each split, but that particular writing community just was never the same, so I mostly drifted off my own way again, spinning haiku as I went.

Anyway, flash forward four years, and I’m still here. Still not crypto rich, but… maybe soon (if Hive or Cub ever moons!)

Here’s to the next four years!

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It’s also the equinox today, which marks the beginning of Shūbun according to the Japanese almanac, the 24 sekki. Although the western calendar sets the beginning of autumn at the autumn equinox, according to the 24 sekki the equinox marks the middle of the season. Shūbun in fact means autumn divide.

Look at the bottom. 秋 (aki) is autumn, and 秋分 is Shūbun, which you can see is at the beginning of the second half of autumn.

Shūbun is subdivided into three microseasons. From today until the 27th is 雷乃収声, which is read Kaminari sunawachi koe o osamu^[1] and translates to something like thunder stops or thunder softens its voice. The meaning is that the typical summer storms are coming to an end around this time.

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So happy hive birthday to me and happy shūbun to all of you! Let's all of us have a good one!

❦

	David LaSpina is an American photographer and translator lost in Japan, trying to capture the beauty of this country one photo at a time and searching for the perfect haiku.

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1. Or rai sunawachi koe o osamu, according to the Japanese wikipedia (see here. There is no agreed upon way to pronounce many of the kanji that make up the 24 sekki seasons, so you will see variations. That said, most sources I’ve read give the reading as Kaminari sunawachi koe o osamu. ↩