Steve Christilaw: Late summer a great time to take stock of fall sports

We call these the dog days of summer.

Dog in the astronomical sense. Not in the canine sense.

I’ve never had a dog that seemed to enjoy the dog days of summer. They much preferred to be indoors where it was cooler than to be roasting themselves in the August heat. And forget about going for a walk on the street. If the asphalt is hot enough to slow-fry an egg, it’s too hot for a dog’s paws.

I knew the phrase had something to do with the Dog Star, Sirius. A colleague pointed me toward a National Geographic story that explained it simply. The dog days of summer refers to the time when the Dog Star rises before the sun in late July. It’s the hottest time of the year, and the ancient Greeks and Romans believed that this time of year is a period that could bring on fever or, perhaps, even catastrophe.

And that’s true enough.

The fever part may not always come true, but it can certainly feel like it when the temperatures creep up toward the 100-degree mark.

And the catastrophe is certainly accurate. This is the time of year when it begins to feel like we are surrounded by fire and the scent of smoke is our default perfume. When you see the devastation up close, it literally burns itself into your memory.

I spent several years growing up living on Lake Chelan, where there are six seasons to every year: winter, spring, summer, fall, apple harvest and forest fire. There were years when you didn’t dare turn off the radio for fear of missing a critical update about which direction the nearby fires were breaking.

As a kid, I remember donning a shirt come winter, one that I hadn’t worn since late summer, and catching the scent of smoke from when it had been hung outside on the line to dry.

The dog days of summer have a different meaning now.

They are a reminder to take extra care of the family dogs – make sure they have plenty of water, with an occasional ice cube tossed in (they like that), so that they can stay well hydrated the same way I always carry cold water.

They are days when you can watch the plants on your porch wither in the heat, and watch your favorite baseball team wither after the trade deadline.

Fortunately, both have yet to happen this year. The plants look good and the Mariners are hanging in there – too far behind the front-running Astros but still within striking distance of a wild-card spot.

It’s a time when professional football fans begin to rejoice at the start of the NFL season. The first exhibition game of the 2017-18 season is Thursday night.

It’s a time to inspect team rosters, keep a wary eye out for nagging injuries and look for clues that may tip off how the season will unfold. Signing Kam Chancellor to an extension is a good sign; lackluster play from backup quarterbacks not so much.

It’s time to begin to make tailgating plans for local college football. This should be another banner year for the sport in the Greater Spokane area. Washington State has been picked to contend in the Pac-12 North with Washington and Stanford – especially if they can shake an annoying habit of faltering early against less-than-stellar competition.

Eastern Washington debuts with a new head coach this season, Aaron Best, but with the same high expectations we’ve come to set under Paul Wulff and Beau Baldwin.

And my personal favorite spot on a fall Saturday is the Pine Bowl at Whitworth, where the Bucs annually put on a great show in a gorgeous setting for college football.

Closer to home, the first few weeks of August are the dead time in the high school sports calendar.

The summer leagues have ended, for the most part. High school coaches are barred from attending workouts with their players until the first day practice is allowed – Aug. 16 this year for football, Aug. 21 for volleyball, soccer and cross country.

It’s too early to dive too deeply into the particulars of each individual season, although there are plenty of reasons to get excited for what the coming fall sports season will bring.

But it is a great time to bask in the prospects of what could be later. Enjoy these days – when every team is tied with the exact same record and the chances of post-season glory are tantalizingly close for everyone.

As they say, every dog has its day.